


Gold

by NotEvenCloseToStraight



Series: Fairy Tale AU's [5]
Category: Deadpool - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: (I tried), Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Angst with a Happy Ending, Body Modification, Curses, Drama & Romance, Drowning, Falling In Love, Fate & Destiny, First Kisses, Happily Ever After, M/M, Mer!Peter, Mermaid Sex, Peril, Peter Rescues Wade, Prince Wade, References to Depression, Reunion, Romantic Soulmates, Separation and Loss, Shiklah - Freeform, Spideypool - Freeform, Wade Wilson Needs A Hug, Witches, mermaid au, slight body horror
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-24
Updated: 2020-10-27
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:28:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 25,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27181135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NotEvenCloseToStraight/pseuds/NotEvenCloseToStraight
Summary: When mer!Peter rescues Prince!Wade from a shipwreck, they are irreversibly bound as soulmates. But humans and mers aren't meant to be together, so after one day together Peter leaves Wade on the beach, and returns to the sea alone.Wade can't forget his mer, not the gold in Peter's eyes or their heated kisses, and he goes mad from the memories. His search for a way back to the sea leads him to Shiklah, and Wade is desperate enough to bargain with the witch-- his beauty and charm for a chance to see Peter again.A witch's promise is a fickle thing and once Wade says 'yes', Shiklah takes what she wants then turns the Prince to a mer and tosses him off a cliff into the sea.Wade wanders lost beneath the waves-- his beauty gone and skin ruined, his tail cut up and scarred. His charm is stripped away and he is angry, raging and violent and hearing voices in the currents as insanity creeps closer every day.The oceans are vast, and he is hopelessly lost, but even if Wade finds Peter again, how can they be together when he isn't the same man Peter pulled from the shipwreck? He is a monster now, and Peter won't want him.Will Wade ever see his soulmates eyes swirl Gold in love again?
Relationships: Peter Parker/Wade Wilson
Series: Fairy Tale AU's [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1566850
Comments: 78
Kudos: 395





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A commission for @paranormalmoonlight5 and @pumpkin-spidey who wanted a reverse-ish Little Mermaid AU ft. Mer!Peter and Prince!Wade. I prefer my mer’s to be man eating and vicious, but I settled for sappy sweet, over the top dramatic, and soulmate-y this time around! 
> 
> Applicable warnings: Wade almost drowns, there is mentions of eating people (honestly what do you expect from my mermaids?) and an attempt at nekkidness.

Three months the Prince had been gone from his home.

It was a sea journey of ten days to visit a neighboring territory with the intent of striking an alliance and quieting the murmurs of unrest and war between the people. The negotiations had stretched weeks, fruitless and ultimately pointless, going round and round with the same arguments and senseless disagreements, neither side willing to budge but both demanding the other yield. 

_War_ had crept closer with every disjointed summit, despair had tinged the last of the conditions and pleas and when all was said and done, the Prince was returning home having failed to secure a truce, and needing to ready his men for the coming conflict. 

King Thomas would not be pleased, but Wade didn’t care much about his father’s wishes. The younger Prince Francis should have been sent to find a truce, it was well known that Wade was a warrior not a politician, a fighter not a peace seeker, a Prince better suited to life outside the castle walls than one spent inside with finery and fawning dignitaries and the search for a husband or wife to sit beside him on the throne. 

But the King’s wishes couldn’t be ignored, so for three months Wade had given up his swords and armor to sit through negotiations and wagers for peace. Three months of endless banal pleasantries and asinine small talk, suffering the attentions of ladies-and-men in waiting who vied for his attention, for his bed, for his desire. Put upon manners to impress strangers and politely but firmly worded rejections of whispered offers. 

_Insufferable_ , all of it.

Wade wanted nothing to do with court affairs that were laughter and kisses at dusk, then anger and drama at dawn. The Prince had no one waiting at home for him, nor a lover at one of the oft visited ports, and Wade considered himself lucky to be missing the _trouble_. 

Though handsome, the Prince had never been one to take casual lovers, and though his blue eyes and blond hair brought to mind Adonis, he had never attempted to pursue a more permanent relationship. There was no one who caught Wade’s eye or stirred his lust, and after the desire and experimentation of youth, those urges had mostly fallen away all together. 

Not for lack of want, but for lack of _interest_. If Wade could find someone that woke his _heart_ , perhaps then desire would spark but until then he slept alone, went through his days alone, and in the quietest moments before dawn, when the world was still and there was nothing but the sound of the ocean beyond his windows, the Prince’s soul ached for something he couldn’t quite understand. 

The weeks and months away had only amplified Wade’s misery, and the misery had turned to abject loneliness. The days stuffed into ridiculous clothing and forced to attend society events under the guise of courting favor with an ally. The hours spent doing _nothing_ while men who would never understand war talked of soldier’s lives and the cost of ruined countryside. The letters from King Thomas demanding updates and encouraging specific action. The quiet sneers from those gathered who knew Wade was sent to do a job out of his depth, the mocking disdain from others who saw a soldier and not a Royal, a pretty face and empty, disinterested eyes. 

And Wade was both empty _and_ disinterested, which is why with three months gone and no peace achieved, he now stood at the railing of the ship _Sister Margaret_ and stared up into a blackening, stormy sky and wondered if the gods would grant him reprieve enough to cause them to be _lost_. 

Perhaps he and the sailors could wander to a distant shore, wind up somewhere _different_ than where his life was headed. Wade’s soul ached with the need to run, to escape, to throw himself from the ship and strike out on his own because every shift in the wind that steered him home felt like the snap of a manacle tightening round his wrist. 

The Prince stood at the railing and silently begged the skies to change the course of his fate, and as the night darkened and the moon hid behind roiling clouds, the skies _listened_. 

The first of many winter storms chose tonight to unleash it’s fury, bearing down on the _Sister Margaret_ with all the force of a hurricane, tearing the ships sails to tatters and battering the hull to and fro in ever rising waves. A crewman was lost over the edge as the _Sister Margaret_ heaved dangerously in the surf, another taken with a scream when a main beam cracked and split and after a terrifying moment _fell_ and swept the deck with it’s length before crashing into the sea. 

Lightning cut jagged through the sky and thunder pitched low and furious, shaking the men to their very bones and rattling the teeth in their heads. Those whose fright outweighed their common sense ran below for dubious shelter from the sideways rains, those who had sailed through storms before tied themselves to the remaining masts with quick release knots in case the ship started to go under. 

Wade held onto the railing until his knuckles were white, eyes wide as he searched the lightning lit seas for rocks, for land, for anything that could be their savior or something _else_ that would be their certain doom. He’d prayed for a different course and wished for a change in the winds but he’d only meant for a respite from his responsibilities and the shackles of a royal life. Not _this_ , not a storm, not the durability of his ship and the fate of his men held at the mercy of a furious sea, not death as an escape, not the horrors of drowning and the agony of being crushed by the depths. 

_No_ , the Prince had only wanted some time to find the answer to what was clawing at his soul, he had never wanted–

– “Rocks of the starboard side! To port! To port! Brace yourself!”–

–the _Sister Margaret_ shredded herself on the jagged peaks of jutting rocks, her sides splitting and the water roaring as it rushed to fill her hull. The screams of men huddled below were lost beneath the pitch of thunder, the scramble of footsteps as sailors ran for the other side of the ship rang dully in Wade’s ears as he watched the sails rend from the mast rings and fall to the deck as a death shroud. 

The entire ship _heaved_ , twisted and thrown by an errant wave and Wade’s grasp at the railing slipped and failed, his body tossed into the air as if it were no consequence, the surface of the sea like glass where it burned and bruised as he hit the water and then slid under and in just those few seconds, Wade’s wish for his fates to be altered was effectively, brutally, granted. 

_I don’t want to die._

The water was shockingly cold and inky black. Lightning cut across the sky and illuminated the _Sister Margaret_ as her holds splintered and the ocean took her apart. It flashed in the eyes of desperate sailors as they swam for the rocks, for the shore, for anything that wasn’t death. The wind howled and muted Wade’s hoarse shout as his heavy coat dragged him under the surf and boots filled with frigid water, dragging him down and down and _down_. 

The rocks meant they were close enough to shore to almost be home, to almost be safe, so close yet so far, near enough to be tempting, far enough to be damning and Wade was _sinking_. 

_I don’t want to die._

It wasn’t easy for him to admit to being afraid, not easy for a Prince and a soldier to admit to being scared but as the dark clouds spilt rain like ice and the sea stormed, Wade _sank_ and he was frightened to his very core. 

_I don’t want to die._

His brain was screaming for oxygen, his lungs fighting the urge to breathe and Wade clawed towards the surface– towards what he _thought_ was the surface– as another wave crashed over his head and sent him spinning, another piece of debris from the ship cut into his midsection and made him wheeze, another wash of water pummeled him and Wade tasted salt water on his tongue, down his throat, burning into his stomach and seizing up his airways. 

_I don’t want to die._

The water was glacial and the Prince’s body was leaden, sluggish as he drifted down, eyes blurred as he stared through the dark to find the last lights from the _Sister Margaret_ as she staggered to stay upright but couldn’t stop from sliding under. 

_I’m going to die._

It was a moment of near delirium as Wade clung to the last shreds of self control to keep from _breathing_ the briny wash, it was a jolt of sheer panic as the Prince found one last dreg of strength to kick up _up_ , it was a blink of his spirit hovering between death and life and in that one eternal second, Wade thought he saw _eyes_ looking back at him. 

_Eyes_ bright golden in the fathomless depths. A flash of sharp teeth behind dark red lips. A dust of glitter on bare skin and webbed fingers reaching reaching, claws scraping scraping and dragging him _down_. 

And in the swirling currents before darkness rushed in and ended his life, the Prince swore he heard a song, haunting and sweet and hypnotic and his own soul soul shifted and yearned, burned bright and tried to answer–

–above the surface the last piece of the _Sister Margaret_ slipped below the waves into the empty beneath–

–and the Prince saw nothing more, heard nothing more, became nothing more as the sea took him as its own. 

************

************

“Wake up, sailor.” The voice was coaxing and melodic, the brush of fingers at Wade’s cheek somehow both feather soft and razor sharp all at the same time. “The afternoon sun will bake you dry and it would be such a pity to ruin your lovely skin.” 

_Music_. Wade still tasted ocean at the back of his throat and clogging fear low in his stomach but all he could think about was _music_ , a haunting melody swirling round his ears and settling in his heart and lighting behind his eyes like sunshine. _Music_. 

“P–pretty–” the Prince croaked, lips chapped and tongue thick from dehydration, limbs unresponsive and eyes crusted shut from the ocean spray. “G-gold–”

“Yes, I’m very pretty.” Came a teasing answer. “And my eyes turn very gold, but you couldn’t possibly know that unless you open _your_ eyes, so why don’t you wake up all the way and see me?” 

“Open….” Wade was still lost, his body adrift as if he was still spinning in the waves, his lungs burning like he was still drowning but he sucked in a painful breath all the same, forced his mouth to open and pull in oxygen sweet oxygen to bring his too raw senses back to coherence one by one. 

First there was _pain_ – scrapes and cuts stinging from salt water, a pattern of bruises no doubt blooming purple and blue along his back and side. Dimly, only _dimly_ Wade remembered being thrown from the Sister Margaret and dropping into the stormy sea and the abrupt hit explained the way it hurt to breathe. He’d most likely broken a rib hitting the water so hard, or it might have been a bruised rib that cracked when a piece of the _Sister Margaret_ had slammed into him in the melee.

Either way he hurt, Wade _hurt_ from the bottom of his bootless feet clear to the migraine pounding behind his eyes and after the initial pain came a wash of panic, of _fear_. What had happened to his men? To the rest of the ship? What of King Thomas who was expecting him home, what of the failed negotiations and the potentially impending war? How far from home was he, and had anyone survived the ship sinking?

…had _Wade_ survived the ship sinking? He heard music through his mind and yet everything hurt. Was this an illusion? A hallucination? Was the Prince wavering in some moment between living and death and this was something of a purgatory?

“I can almost hear you thinking.” Another touch at Wade’s temple that was both infinitely soft and wholly dangerous, the fine edge of what felt like a claw down Wade’s jawline and calloused fingertips at his cheek. “What is on your mind, my love?”

“…my—my–”

“I pulled you from the waves.” The voice was closer now, sunshine and warmth and _music_ on the Prince’s scattered thought process. “Most of your men survived clinging to the debris from the ship. Some succumbed to my sisters, others were left to the sharks, but I saved you.”

Wade tried and tried and tried to open his eyes, forced the lagging lids to part and blinked into a too bright sun as he tried to see who or _what_ was at his side. 

“If you were anyone else I would think about eating you.” Wade’s savior giggled, and it was almost terrifying in it’s beauty. “But you’re far too good looking for that. It would be a shame to rid the world of someone so lovely because I wanted to bite you, and once I got closer and saw you, I couldn’t do it.”

“B–Bite me?” Wade licked his lips and struggled to focus, his vision clearing enough to make out a hazy form leaning over him. “You– you were going to bite me?” 

“I was going to _devour_ you.” the creature corrected with a smile that glinted fanged and sharp and almost fond. “But then I heard you, truly _heard_ you, and I had to know you instead.”

“That’s– that’s good.” Wade inhaled shakily, dragged the air in through salt burned lungs and grimaced when every molecule of oxygen stung. “That’s um– I don’t want to be devoured.” 

“Are you what they call a Prince Charming?” The creature tilted his head and tapped a delicate claw along with the rhythm of Wade’s heart beat. “I’ve heard them talk about ones like you. Handsome. Brave. Trying to conquer the world and sailing your ships through the sea as if you own it. A ridiculous idea, you don’t own the waves anymore than you own the wind but you like to think it, don’t you?” 

“You’ve heard who talk about it?” Wade leaned up onto his elbows, shifted sideways with a painful wheeze so the creature’s head was blocking out most of the sun and he could actually see. “What do you mean they call me a Prince Charming? Who are _they_?” 

“The humans, of course.” they answered, and then, “Let me help your eyes, my love. Hold still.”

_My love?_

Wade only had enough time to wonder why the creature kept calling him _my love_ before a cold palm with oddly webbed fingers covered his eyes. It was suddenly warm and suddenly _bright_ and the Prince gasped and flinched away partly in surprise, partly in fear, but the creature only laughed soft again and used the hand at Wade’s chest to hold him still with near unbelievable strength.

“Just a moment, just a moment, just a moment, I know this burns.” they whispered. “I know this burns but I’ll be gentle afterwards, I promise. My mate, I promise I’ll be gentle, just a moment…”

 _My love, my mate, gentle._ The words were blurry in Wade’s mind, blurry like his vision and sluggish like the way his fingers still felt numb and his limbs felt so heavy and the Prince thought maybe he could sleep– maybe he could _drown_ – if it weren’t for the music wrapping low and soothing through his psyche and reverberating against the pressure of the creature’s hands on his body.

_My love, my mate, gentle–_

–and then Wade could _see_.

“Oh.” he gasped and jerked up right to sitting when his vision suddenly cleared, the headache gone and the ache in his core easing. “Oh fu—fu–what did you did you? What did you _do_?”

“I healed you.” Came the simple answer. “Some of us can heal, others only harm but _all_ of us can help our mates if needed. You needed me, so I helped you.” 

“You– you helped me.” the Prince wiped at his mouth and shook his head until the last of the cobwebs cleared and he could see.

Wade could _see_ and all he could see was otherworldly beauty– sun bronzed skin and bare shoulders dusted with ethereal glitter, gold flecked eyes and hair tumbling in loose curls, temptingly pink lips and hooked fangs that glinted sunlight in a knowing smile. Claws and webbed fingers, strong arms and a distractingly defined abdomen that led to a narrow waist and lean hips and a– a tail.

Mother of the gods, the creature had a _tail_. 

“You’re a mermaid.” Wade croaked. “You’re a mermaid– mer– merman. Mer–” 

“I’m a mer, yes.” The water by Wade’s leg splashed beneath it’s tail and the creature wrinkled his nose teasingly when Wade’s jaw dropped. “Some of your people call us mermen, others call us sirens or water nymphs.” 

A smile that was dangerous in its intent. “Those we eat call us _monsters_ , but those cries and accusations never last long once the water turns bloody.” 

“No I–” Wade gripped at the rocky sand beneath his fingers anxiously. “No, I suppose they don’t. You– you don’t want to eat me though. I’m all muscle, no fat. I’d be tough and stringy.” 

“All muscle?” the mer cocked a curious eyebrow then pressed those webbed fingers to feel along the Prince’s chest, down his abdomen and across the shifting muscles and down lower to drag a clawed finger along the dip at Wade’s hip bone. “Ah. I see. _Mmmmmm_.”

The noise was almost hypnotic, sort of a moan and nearly a purr and despite his fatigue and near death experience, every line in Wade’s body tightened, _surged_ , and he heard the echo of _music_ in his soul all over again.

“God.” His nervousness was forgotten as his heart rate skyrocketed, a surge of arousal as much a relief as it was foreign. _When was the last time he had wanted anyone, and why did this creature stir him so?_ “God, I think I’d let you bite me just to hear you make that noise again.” 

“Don’t tempt me.” The mer’s delighted laugh was like bells, like wind chimes and like the songs from the temples that echoed across the hills and it shook Wade to his _core_ , made his next breath hitch like he was drunk as the mer inched closer, then closer again until their noses nearly met and the gold in it’s eyes gleamed. “I want to know you. Tell me your name, Prince Charming.” 

“My name is Wade.” They were close now, Wade sitting up on his elbows and the mer still leaning over him, close enough that Wade could see the swirls of color in the mer’s eyes and count the fan of his lashes. “Prince Royal Wade Wilson of the Eastern Kingdom. I am King Thomas’s first born and Lieutenant General of his troops, venturer onto the sea and apparently–”

Wade looked down at his body, at his missing boots and torn pants, shredded, sodden shirt and his feet and calves still dangling in the water. “–apparently someone who washes up nearly naked on the shore.”

The mer laughed again, eyes lighting brilliantly happy at Wade’s sense of humour and the Prince cleared his throat a few times before asking, “What’s your name?”

“You couldn’t pronounce it.” he shrugged half heartedly, one slim shoulder rising and falling with the motion. “But the closest to your language would be Peter, so you can call me _Peter_.”

“Peter.” Wade repeated, and the mer actually shuddered over it, tail twitching and fingers flexing at Wade’s abdomen. “…Pete?”

“Yes.” Pete sighed and settled a little tighter to Wade’s frame. “ _Mmmm_ , hearing my name on your mouth is lovely. Say it again.”

 _Again_. Wade cleared his throat. “P—Pete. Why did you save me?”

“Because I heard your soul.” Peter smoothed his palm down Wade’s chest again, pink tongue slipping distractingly over his teeth. “We heard the screams of your men so my sisters and I came to see what could be salvaged from the wreck, but when you hit the water the very currents changed their direction and brought your song to me. I had to find you.”

And then softer, the beautiful features shuttering and falling sad. “I didn’t expect to find a _human_ floating beneath the waves, but I had to save you anyway.”

“You heard my soul? My song?” the Prince couldn’t stop staring at the glint of the sharp fangs behind the mer’s lips. “What– what does that mean?”

“Your heart song.” Peter said again. “Your soul cried out for me when the ocean took you, so I came to save you.” 

The mer added softer, almost nervously, “You didn’t hear mine when you fell? When the water came up over your ears, you didn’t hear my song calling back to you?”

Wade thought back to the moments where he thought he was dying, how his boots had filled with water and his coat had dragged him down and then there’d been golden eyes and reaching fingers and–

–and _music_.

“The music in the storm.” he whispered. “That was you?”

“You heard it.” Peter smiled again, pleased and so beautiful it took Wade’s breath away. “When I saw you were mortal, I was afraid you wouldn’t hear the melody, but whether you did or not, I had to save you. I took your jacket and your boots so you wouldn’t drown and brought you here where the wind is buffered by the rocks until you woke up. Safe.”

“You took care of me?”

“I just wanted to see you.” Peter touched Wade just lightly, pushed apart what was left of Wade’s shirt and bared his skin to the late morning sky. “You were asleep for so long and I kept watch so the others wouldn’t come and drag you back into the sea to tear you apart. I wanted to make sure you were safe and I thought I’d leave when you woke, but I—I couldn’t.”

The mer seemed almost sad as he spread webbed fingers over Wade’s navel and lowered his head to rest his forehead over Wade’s heart. “I should go now. It must have been a fluke, a moment where your soul wasn’t quite human and your heart song reached for me. A mer and a human cannot be together, so now that I know you’re safe, I’ll leave you be.”

Peter pushed away from Wade’s body, pushed himself back into the water until he was submerged up to his chin, only his fingers hooked around Wade’s ankle and holding fast.

“Go well, Prince Charming.” the mer whispered, then took a deep breath and opened his mouth to sing a siren song of forgetfulness–

– “Wait.” Wade lunged after Peter, scrambled towards the water and fell into up to his chest when his legs didn’t want to quite work right. “Wait, Pete _wait_.”

“My love, don’t make this any more difficult than it needs to be.” The water barely rippled when Peter moved, the mer so graceful even as he swam backwards that the sea surface remained glassy smooth. “This song will make you forget, and when you wake again you won’t know me at all. You’re safe and I should leave you–”

“What does it mean that I heard your song?!” Wade burst out, grabbing fruitlessly at the water, at Peter’s form as the mer slid further away. “What does that mean? I can feel it right here.” he pushed at his own chest, at his heart. “Feel it in my soul, where I’ve never felt anything at all so what does it _mean_?”

Peter swallowed, gills on his neck flicking open once, twice, but he didn’t answer and Wade persisted, “For years I’ve been searching for something to fill this gap right here in my soul. It’s like I’m empty but nothing fills it. I’ve never found love and I’ve never wanted to try searching for it. I wage war but not even the battle lust soothes me. I can’t stay home alone with nothing and no one and no idea of what I’m looking for, it will drive me mad. Tell me what it means that I heard your heart song.”

Softer, almost pleading. “Tell me.”

The mer paused, waited and Wade reached his hands out desperately, wanting or needing or– or something. “ _Please_.”

And finally, “Put your hands on the water like this.” Peter took a deep breath and flattened his palms to the surface of the water. “Hold yourself still and wait for the music to come to you on the currents. We are soulmates, you and I. Hold yourself still and let the seas tell you the truth.” 

Wade copied the mer’s movements, spreading his fingers wide and setting them just gently on the barely there waves, holding his breath and waiting–

 _Melody_ filling Wade’s ears and echoing in his mind, magical and mystical and spiraling _home home home,_ wrapping around his body and washing over his soul, filtering through his heart and echoing through his mind and Wade was running, _running_ for Peter before he could stop himself, stumbling through the waves and almost going under when his feet slipped on the rocks and scraped along the coral as he _ran_ for his soulmate. 

“Don’t leave me.” They met in a crash of lips, Peter’s strength keeping them easily afloat when Wade fell into him, mouths meeting and breath gasping and hands holding tight lest the other one slip away. “Don’t leave me.” Wade choked out. “God, I have to _know_ you.”

“They say it’s like this sometimes.” Peter scraped his nails down Wade’s back and hooked his fingers into the Prince’s hips to drag him in tight, beat his tail in the water to keep them steady so he could feel everything about his _soulmate_ up against his body. “When a human soul slips between life and death, in that moment they are ours, _our_ soulmate, but only in that moment. Never more. It isn’t meant to be. You and I aren’t meant to be and that’s why I should have left you before now.”

Peter made a halfhearted attempt to move away, to extricate himself from Wade’s grip though the mer was holding just as fast. “I should have left you before now, my love and I’m sorry I’m making this more difficult for you.” 

“Don’t go.” Wade was _starving_ , dehydrated, aching and the only thing that soothed him was the taste of soulmate on his mer’s lips. “No no no, don’t go. Pete, you’re who I’ve been searching for my entire life. _Soulmate_. Kiss me. Kiss me.”

“Just once more.” Peter whispered. “Just once more then I must go.”

The kiss was drugging, heart crushing and soul stirring. On and on it went as Wade drifted further into the currents and Peter kept him buoyant, the sea lapping higher around their shoulders until it was till their necks, higher still until it brushed their chins and mixed salt water into their kisses. Peter shifted against his body and purred soft and sweet, the noise so close to heaven that Wade had to jerk away to take in a deep breath– 

–and then he was _drowning_.

Wade went under, lungs full of water and body dragging down, mind rushing from the kiss, from the knowledge of his soulmate, skin tingling as fresh cuts were re-submerged and hands reaching always reaching for the one that had finally called him home.

 _I could drown._ The Prince thought as black spots danced before his eyes. _I could drown and find a place beside my soulmate forever._

_I could drown._

_He was drowning._

“Oh my love, I’m so sorry!” Peter cried out in alarm when Wade slipped below the surface and _sank_. The mer angled his body and dove down into the murky water until he could get his arms around his mate and bring the Prince back to air, cradling Wade carefully so his claws wouldn’t pierce the fragile skin and driving them both back towards the safety of sand and rock so Wade could breathe. 

“So sorry, my love.” Peter bent over Wade’s still form and pulled the water from the humans lungs with one quick breath, put his hand to the Prince’s stomach and coaxed the water out with one solid push. “I got carried away and you nearly drowned, so sorry. Please wake up. Please wake up.” 

Wade woke with a cough, jerked back from unconsciousness with a strangled sort of gasp, reached for Peter before he was even aware he was moving, grasping for his soulmate even though only a few minutes ago he hadn’t known soulmates existed. 

“Pete.” 

“I’m so sorry.” The mer’s eyes were shifting electric gold and the deepest, richest brown with sorrow and worry. “Wade, I’m so sorry I didn’t mean to let you go. I wanted to swim with you but I forgot– I’m sorry–” 

“No no don’t be sorry, just come back. Come _back_.” Wade surged up and wrapped his arms around Peter again, dragged the mer down on top of his body and kissed the cool lips until Peter was purring against his mouth and trilling in his ear, fangs catching on his bottom lip and claws dragging red lines in his skin. 

It was like the sweetest aphrodisia kissing Peter, like the honeyed mead Wade had drank along the islands pouring down his throat, like the smoke of the poppy plant when it burned heavy and thick in the air of the secret places in the city.

 _Drugging_. 

_Soulmates_ , and it was the answer to every question the Prince had ever had, every moment when he had felt out of place in the palace, trapped by his father’s words and penned in by his duties, by his expectations, by the rules.

 _Soulmates_ and it was hard to care about which men might have survived the storm, about the _Sister Margaret_ in pieces on the ocean floor, about whether he was dying from dehydration, or hovering on the cusp of some near death experience and tipping wildly towards unalive.

They were _soulmates_ , and Wade would have taken dehydration and death over having to stop running eager hands over Peter’s back and down to where flawless skin transformed into silk smooth scales. Peter’s tail was gorgeous, layers of dark red shot through with royal blue webbing that went from his hips clear down to the nearly translucent tail that flipped against the water in a steady, meaningful pattern, beating a drummed in rhythm into Wade’s heart that felt like– felt like–

“My love.” Peter whispered, and there was a cut of fangs at Wade’s earlobe before nimble fingers skated over the front of his trousers, working at the clasp and pushing them aside to track gently gently over the hard ridge of his cock.

“Oh.” Wade’s head snapped back against the rocks but the mer caught him with a quiet laugh, cradled his head in one large palm and held him steady so he didn’t hurt himself. “Oh-h-h _Pete_ –”

 _Yes_ , that was what it felt like, what the constant shift and hit of Peter’s red and blue tail sounded like, what the ripple of water and _push push push_ and the way the mer’s hips ground into Wade’s side reminded him of. It felt like strokes and heated touches and purposefully slick slides against a willing, welcoming body and it felt like–

“ _Settle_ , soulmate.” Peter purred into his ear when Wade cursed and thrust up into the mer’s palm. “Oh you’re gorgeous, I knew you would be gorgeous.” He mouthed hungry kisses and near bites down Wade’s throat, massaged firmer at his cock until it jerked and throbbed in his fingers, spilled milky white over his knuckles and made the next stroke easier. “I knew you would be perfect, so responsive for me, my Prince Charming.”

“Don’t stop.” Wade had never wanted anyone so badly in his life, the Prince had maybe never wanted _anyone_ in his life, not like this, not when it felt like his very center was trying to claw it’s way out of his chest to mingle with his mer.

 _Not meant to be_ , Peter had whispered mournfully. _I had to know you but we are not meant to be._

But no, Wade couldn’t believe it. _Wouldn’t_ believe it. It wasn’t possible to need to know someone the way he needed to know Peter and they weren’t meant to be?

_It wasn’t possible._

“I want you.” he rasped and Peter’s tongue wound tempting and knowing along his collarbone, down Wade’s chest until fangs pricked over his nipple in a dangerous, tempting spark. “God, Pete I want you.”

Peter shuddered again hearing his name on his soulmate’s tongue. They weren’t meant to be and he should have left before now but the mer was weak, he was _weak_ for every inch of his Prince Charming, he was weak for the press of Wade’s hands at his back and the way sparks lit bright behind his eyes when calloused fingers teased the junction of skin and scales, he was weak for the way Wade practically growled as he shifted and widened his knees so Peter could lay closer between his thighs.

His Prince was achingly hard, pre-come leaking from the tip of his cock as Peter stroked him slowly, almost idly, no real rush to the motion because just having his soulmate in his hand was _enough_. After years and years of wandering the ocean currents listening for the heart song that called to his entire being, it was enough to lick the sweetness from Wade’s mouth, to lay chest to chest and feel his Prince’s every breath hitch as they moved together, to tighten his fingers around the swollen cock and swallow the moans that spilled from his mate’s lips.

“I want you too.” he whispered back. They weren’t meant to be but perhaps he could just have this, just this moment before the sun set and Wade’s soul found it’s way all the way back to living and Peter had to sing a siren’s song to wash the human’s memory clean of their time together.

“I want you too.” he repeated and Wade curled up into a sharp kiss full of tongue and _longing_. “Touch me, Prince Charming, touch me here.” 

Peter took Wade’s hand and guided it down his stomach to the top of his tail, sucked in a quick, aching breath when his Prince’s fingers dipped into his navel before skating lower and the mer had to shift off to the side so he wouldn’t crush his love as Wade felt carefully, pointedly further along Peter’s scales until he came to the slight mound of the mer’s pouch, and then a scant inch lower, the scales that would shift aside and allow him _entrance_. 

“Peter.” Wade breathed shakily when he found the almost invisible part in the mer’s tail, when his fingers were along scales one second and then next dipping into silky soft warmth. “P–Pete–” 

“Yesssss.” the mer’s eyes went bright gold then very dark and heavy lidded as pleasure ran in a shiver up his spine, and Peter turned further onto his side to give Wade more room to feel him, balanced himself with his elbow in the sand and gripped rocks in his other hand so he wouldn’t cut his claws into the Prince’s side. “Yes my love, _touch_ me.” 

Wade bit back a hungry moan when his fingers closed around the mer’s cock, heavy and thick as he stroked and coaxed it free of the pouch, ridged and textured in ways that made his mouth water and his core _clench_ , and Peter purred softly, wantonly when Wade’s own cock jerked in response to the sight. 

“Closer.” The mer wriggled closer until they were side by side, face to face in the coarse sand, one of Wade’s legs thrown over his tail. “Closer, my love.” 

Carefully at the Prince’s side, making sure to keep his claws away because too tight a squeeze, too startled or enjoyable a moment and the mer could kill his mate and Peter didn’t even want to take the chance, didn’t want to try and risk it. 

“Like this.” Wade’s hand on his length was heaven, the steady stroke and curious play along the ridges and veins that marked his cock enough to make Peter’s eyes flicker in barely handled pleasure, and the mer whined brokenly at the loss of touch even as he coaxed his Prince’s touch lower still. “Right there, yes. _Yes_.” 

Wade groaned out loud when he found the entrance just below Peter’s cock, slick and nearly hot as it allowed his fingers in and Peter gasped high and needy, rocked forward into the tentative press and drove Wade deeper inside. 

Something _shocked_ , blurted and breathless from the mer’s mouth, a language Wade could never hope to understand but rapture was the same across any tongue and he tasted it in their next kiss as Peter panted and sighed and nipped at Wade’s tongue as they tangled together. 

“You’d have me?” Wade whispered in hoarse disbelief as his mate pressed closer, twitched his tail and lifted his hips up eagerly. “Pete, you would allow me to have you like this?” 

“I’d allow you anything.” Fangs, drawing blood at Wade’s throat and the pain tore a _shout_ from him, but there was nothing but blinding pleasure immediately after as the mer sealed his lips to the cut and drank the blood like he was starving. “My love, I’d allow you anything for the moments we have together, but you will have to have me like _this_.” 

_Oooph_. Wade’s back hit the sand harder than he’d been expecting, Peter was far stronger than the lean muscles and gorgeous curve of his body would suggest, but the Prince only marveled at his mate’s strength, one hand buried inside Peter’s body and the other stroking over the glitter on Peter’s shoulders, down to the dip of his waist, back up to skip over the rows of his abdomen. 

“You’re beautiful.” he managed as Peter lay over him, twisted his fingers inside the mer’s entrance and pulled a thready cry from gorgeous pink lips. “My love–” 

Peter’s eyes melted molten gold in happiness and Wade said it again, crooned it, “ _My love_ —” and their lips met in the slowest kiss yet, lingering over bite-tender marks and licking through the others mouth, sharing breath, sharing air, sharing their souls as the mer reached with one hand to lift Wade’s fingers free of his body, then closed his palm around Wade’s cock. 

“I’d allow you like this, my mate.” the mer whispered, and it was sheer _insanity_ what they were doing. Pure madness for them to be kissing, to be moving together, for Peter to stroke his Prince to full hardness with a single pull and then with a slow roll of his hips, a flex of his tail and with claws scoring lines on the rocks as he fought for control, to take Wade clear into his body. 

“My mate.” he shuddered when the Prince slipped into him, cried something wordless and needy when Wade held him tight and thrust up helplessly and Peter quieted Wade’s answering shout with a messy kiss, swallowed down the Prince’s gasped curse with a low purr, held his mate _still_ until they both could breathe again. 

“ _Peter_.” 

“Let me.” Peter tried not to growl, but it might have been a growl anyway with the way Wade cursed into his ear, cock jerking inside him hard enough to make the mer’s eyes roll back. “No no my love, let me.” 

“Mate.” Wade caught Peter’s hips and held them tight when the mer shifted over him, scooted higher up over his chest and then dug into the sand and pushed back, engulfing Wade’s cock in pure rippling heat. 

“ _Mate_.” Braced on his elbows now, Peter could bend down and tease Wade with soft kisses and the dangerous hint of fangs. He could use the leverage to ease himself down and then pull himself back up, down and up, down and up, clenching tight every time their hips met and his Prince ground up into him, moaning every time they parted and Wade’s cock slid nearly entirely from his body before driving deep again. 

“If you could swim with me, I’d take you to the depths.” Peter hissed when Wade’s teeth closed blunt over his pulse and _pulled_ at him. “I’d show you how we are beneath the sea, I’d fit my cock into your most secret places–” 

“Shit–” Wade jolted and Peter laughed in knowing delight, lost himself in a mind numbing kiss for a long moment, took Wade’s fingers and wound them around his cock to stroke in time to each slow roll of their bodies. 

“–oh my love, I’d spend hours loving you.” he rasped, and Wade groaned something unintelligible and needy. “Over and over I’d spill in you until you were full of me and still begging for more, then I’d catch you tight–” 

He shivered and moaned when the Prince’s hand tightened reflexively along his tip. “–yesss, do you feel that? All the ways my cock would fill you up and lock you tight to me? Then we could float in the currents for hours together. You’d be safe in my arms and I’d be safe in yours and we–” 

The mer stuttered, grit his teeth and let his slick channel ripple around Wade’s cock as he grew closer to finishing. “–and we– we could let the seas hear our heart songs until–” 

“Pete.” Wade thrust up once, twice, threw his head back onto the beach and rocked against him desperately. “Pete _please_ –” 

“I know.” Peter slid himself down along his Prince until he was almost punishingly full, stretched and deliciously aching and he ground down into every helpless twitch and jerk of his mate’s body. “Oh my love, I know.” 

“…want you…” 

“…you _have_ me…” 

It was madness what they were doing, sheer insanity for a man and a mer to tangle this way. The Prince’s soul was caught in the space between living and dead, the mer was risking a life of eternal loneliness giving into the need when he should have just left, should have just waited for Wade’s soul to fully rejoin the living and then gone on his way without his heart song answered. 

But it was too late. It was too late and it was _madness_ but Peter couldn’t find it in himself to stop. 

“Half a century I waited for you.” he murmured, and Wade turned his head to catch him up in an achingly tender kiss. “I’ll wait a half a century more for another chance.” 

_Music_ , warping the air and stirring the calm harbor waters into waves as Wade tipped and teetered at the edge of bliss. _Music_ , thrumming in time to their hearts as Peter’s cock spilled onto Wade’s stomach and the Prince lost himself inside the mer’s body, pulsing and pouring and skittering searing pleasure through his veins. 

_Music_ , as they left a bloody sharp kiss and stared into each other eyes, a heart song as the sun began to sink behind them, a melody as Wade reached to wipe a tear that fell like a diamond from Peter’s golden eyes. 

“….Pete?” 

But the mer only shook his head and smiled, then tucked his chin into Wade’s shoulder and held him close as the fire between their body’s settled, soothed, and their souls melded one to another. 

_Music_. 

_They were not meant to be._

****************

“You’re beautiful.” Wade propped himself up on an elbow and traced the gorgeous red lines that cut through the darker blue on Peter’s tail, clicking his fingernails on the scales and smiling in awe when the setting sun caught the blue and turned it nearly purple before darkening to practically black. “Red and blue, red and black. Gorgeous.” 

“You humans think the oddest things are beautiful.” Peter stretched back on the sand and purred in contentment as the Prince ran gentle hands over him. “I was caught in a net when I was younger, the wires cut into my tail and left me scarred. I should be wholly blue and flawless but instead it looks like–” 

“Like your tail is set through with rubies.” Wade interrupted, thinking about the priceless treasures he’d seen overseas, the intricately sewn tapestries, silk so fine it sparkled in the sunshine, jewelry that wove like nets and webs along a royals porcelain skin. 

Not one of them compared to how lovely the delicate red lines were as they wound through the blue of Peter’s scales, and though Wade’s heart hurt to think of his mer hurt badly enough to be scarred, selfishly he loved the way Peter shivered and shuddered as he traced each and every one. 

“Beautiful.” he said again and Peter purred at him again, bared those deceptively dangerous fangs in a pleased smile. “Why do your eyes turn gold?” 

“Because you’re my soulmate.” Peter answered simply. “Our eyes only change for our mates. Gold when I am happy or content or when I am–” his dark gaze flickered gold as he lingered over the stretch of muscle on Wade’s reclined form. “–when I am aroused.” 

“You are angelic.” Wade swore, and the mer countered with a soft laugh, “More along the lines of a water demon, but you may call me whichever you’d like.” 

Peter sat up into a kiss, wove his clawed fingers into Wade’s hair and tugged lightly at the blond strands. “You are beautiful too, my love. Your eyes are the color of the ocean in the islands, where the water is bright and clear and we can see down to the sand on the sea floor.” 

“Ah, is that why you came to find me in the wreckage of the ship?” Wade leaned into the touch, sighed and pressed closer when fangs pricked just lightly at his neck. “Because my eyes remind you of the ocean?” 

“I would have found you in the wreckage no matter what color your eyes were.” Peter swore. “Today you look like the sun god fallen to the sand, if tomorrow you were to look like the god of the underworld or a creature of the deep, you’d be my soulmate all the same.” 

“Then why do you seem sad?” Wade wanted to know, and Peter whispered, “Because our time is limited, my love. And somehow I already miss you.” 

“I’m right here.” 

_I already miss you._

Later, the sky turned purple and blue above them, the winds cooling and water turning frigid, the sun setting in a fiery ball at the horizon, and Peter finally eased back from an endless kiss to brush his lips along Wade’s forehead and then his cheek. 

“I have to go.” he whispered sadly. “The sun is setting and so is our song, it’s time for us to part ways.” 

“No.” Wade shook his head, made a fruitless grab for his mer. “No, Pete. Don’t leave me.” 

“I have to go now before it’s too late.” Peter slipped away from Wade’s grasp entirely, checking the sky above him as he scooted backwards into the water. “When the stars come out your soul will be fully back among the living, and humans and mers are not meant to love one another. We had a few moments together, which is more than some soulmates ever have. Sleep, my love and forget me.” 

“I will never forget you!” Wade jerked up to sitting, pulled his feet from water that was turning colder by the second as the sun went down, and lunged after Peter. “Come back! Pete, wait–” 

– _weariness_ hit the Prince like he’d ran into a physical wall, and mid reach, his arm fell back to his side, his legs giving out and keeping him firmly on the sand as the sun dropped another notch in the sky. 

“What–” Wade struggled to even sit up all the way, his breath suddenly coming gasped and choppy, his eyes heavy and leaden. “What’s happening– what’s happening–” 

“Sleep and wake to fully living, Prince Charming.” Peter slid back into the water another few inches, biting at his lip until it bled beneath his fangs as he watched his love struggle just to stay coherent. “I’ll sing you a song to help you forget, and when you open your eyes again, you’ll be safe. I promise.” 

“Will you–” sand fell through Wade’s grasp as he tried to keep himself upright on the beach. “Will you forget me?” 

“The ocean forgets nothing.” the mer’s face twisted in heartbreak when his Prince’s head dropped back, otherworldly sleep calling him in deep. “I’ll remember every moment with you.” 

“…seems… unfair…” 

“Fate is rarely fair.” The last of the sun’s light was on them now, shadows from every direction, covering Wade’s feet and creeping up his legs to his torso, to his chest and just before the darkness reached his lovely face and the call back to living took him entirely, Peter blew his soulmate a kiss and murmured, “Goodbye, my Prince.” 

A siren’s song rose low and haunting over the waves at dusk, coming to Wade on the wind and swirling through his mind like fog. 

He was weary to his very bones, senses clouded with pain that had been absent for hours but suddenly throbbed through every muscle. Every breath was labored and with every one, a little more memory slipped from Wade’s consciousness as the music grew in volume and somehow in sadness. 

_Good-bye my love._

The waves lapped at the Prince’s feet, not quite close enough to touch, but close to lull him to sleep, his eyes closing and heartbeat syncing with the come and go of water on the rocks, the ebb and flow of the tide, the quiet rhythm to the melody that echoed in his heart something painful and heartbroken and lonely…

… by the time the stars came out, Wade couldn’t remember how the hell he’d made it from the wreckage of the Sister Margaret to dry land. He didn’t know why his shirt was torn off, why his pants were loose around his hips or why his body thrummed with the remnants of pleasure. 

The Prince didn’t know why, and in the distance of the harbor a pair of dark eyes watched from afar as Wade looked around in wonder and confusion before giving into the pull of the _music_ and falling back into the sand to sleep. 

“Perhaps another lifetime.” Peter whispered as the last of his siren song faded away on the night wind. “Maybe then your soul will be mine, as mine is forever yours.” 

Wade slept on the beach, and the seas barely rippled as the mer disappeared under the surface to ease his grief below the waves. 

_Perhaps another lifetime._

_******************_

**Chapter Notes** :

> _In some comics Wade has blue eyes and blond hair, so for reasons important to The Plot, I used this description for him vs my usual._
> 
> _Obviously the Sister Margaret is the name of Weasel’s bar, and it also made a perfect ship name._
> 
> _Uhh help I’ve never written mermaid sex before??_
> 
> _How much do we love demisexual Wade who never really saw the appeal of sex until he found the one he was meant to be with?_
> 
> _Recognize the golden eyes from MTW? Yeah, I will never let that trope die, it’s my canon now._


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> TW for this chapter: Deadpool-verse typical depression and mentions of su*cide. Witches and curses. Sort of body horror-ish near the end. Generally what you’d expect from a Spideypool Supernatural Halloween Fic.

….They found the Prince nearly comatose on the beach the next morning, only half dressed and bruised on every visible inch of skin. His feet were just barely in the water, lips and skin chapped from sun exposure, sea salt crusted in his hair and around his lips. There was a cut at his neck that looked like a bite, scrape marks down his chest and what could have been finger nail marks at his side. 

It _almost_ looked as if the Prince had tangled with a wild animal while he tried to come ashore, but it might have just been scrapes from jagged coral and jutting rocks that tore him up so badly. It seemed impossible a man in such a state could swim from the _Sister Margaret_ and drag himself to the beach and the men that found him chalked it up to fast moving currents, a blessing from the gods and a hefty dose of fate and _luck_. 

All that mattered was the Prince was breathing, and those who came searching were relieved to find him before the weather and elements turned again and killed the Prince where he lay. 

It would be _their_ heads rolling if they dared return from the search party empty handed, and every one of the rescuers breathed a half sigh of self concerned relief. 

_They’d live to see another day._

Wade barely stirred as he was transported across the island to the boat dock, only murmured half coherently as they took him below deck on the ship and put him in the infirmary so the doctor could treat the scrapes and bruises. Later at the castle, the Royal Physician would take care of the deeper lacerations and deal with any lingering side effects from Wade being out and exposed in the elements for the better part of twenty four hours, but for now some laudanum and quick bandages would have to do. 

The journey home to the castle was almost depressingly short-- the _Sister Margaret_ had hit the rocks and gone down with no more than a few hours worth of sailing left before they found safe harbor. If the stalwart ship had managed through the night, each and every man aboard would have been sleeping soundly in their own bed come the next morning, but the Prince had prayed to the skies to change his fate…

...and the prayer had doomed them all. 

The sailors that hadn’t been dragged to the depths along with the Sister Margaret were forced to take their chances in stormy, rocky waters and the sharks drawn in by blood. Those who escaped the sharks had been tempted and tantalized and terrorized by the demons of the deep, sirens and mermaids who came to sing and laugh at them, to clutch the sailors close with sharp claws and hooked fangs and drag them _under_. 

Some had been lost but mercifully most were saved, found by rescue ships in the morning and grateful for a reprieve from the hours spent clutching ships’ debris or clinging to the same rocks that had sank the _Sister Margaret_. Once within the safety of the ship and headed towards shore, there were still a few that fell victim to the bone deep shock, to the unrelenting panic and fear, to hypothermia that set into their lungs too quickly and froze them from the inside out. 

The Prince’s plea for a change of fate cost him his ship, the lives and loyalty and trust of his men, and when Wade finally lifted from unconsciousness nearly three days after being found, it was whispered that the shipwreck had cost the Prince his _sanity_ too. 

They said he _grieved_ after the shipwreck-- grieved as if his very soul was splitting in two. The Prince wandered the castle aimlessly and stood for hours staring out at the ocean. When a servant would speak to him, when the King would come by or Prince Francis would bring him a drink, Wade only looked at them with eyes that barely saw anything at all. 

They said he _grieved_ , and maybe the Prince grieved the loss of his men. Maybe he grieved the loss of the _Sister Margaret_ since Wade had helped build the ship right out there in the yard closest to the docks. Perhaps a near death experience in the depths had humbled Wade to the point of misery, perhaps it was the hours drifting in and out of consciousness that drove him to contemplate the meaning of life and the always encroaching shadow of death, perhaps it was a wish _for_ death that took the Prince out of his chambers at all hours of the night and out onto the cliffs to stare at the ocean. 

He sang sometimes, a tuneless random song that was more noise than any decipherable words. The melody was chilling, the pitched echoed as if it came from far away or from very deep under the sea. The Prince _sang_ sometimes and other times he picked out notes on the piano, disjointed sounds in minor keys that made no sense at all and certainly wasn’t a song, but the Prince plinked it out on the ivories and sang along and the entire effect was _chilling_. 

“Get some air.” Thomas told his son uneasily, standing back just a little too far from Wade’s reach. The eldest Prince had always been quick to anger, quick to violence, a soldier more comfortable with twin blades in his grasp than a goblet or a royal scepter. His skill on the battlefield was legendary, the stories of how he killed so coldly and efficiently the thing of nightmares but the King had never worried that behind the skill and viciousness lay _madness_. 

_Now_ he did, though. Now Thomas worried that the shipwreck had permanently altered his eldest son towards psychosis, or that the trauma had uncovered a previously hidden insanity and as the days stretched longer and longer, that worry sank it’s roots deeper and deeper until King Thomas and Prince Francis never approached Wade without a dagger held close by and at the ready. 

Not that some sort of _imbalance_ meant immediate danger but with a man like Wade, one could never be too sure. 

They shouldn't have bothered, though. Wade was too far gone to notice when they came close, maybe not _purposefully_ unblinking as he listened to them talk, but unnervingly still all the same. Maybe not purposefully standing tense and almost intimidating, but hulking and brooding all the same. 

“Get some air.” Thomas would tell him and Wade would look out towards the ocean with the single saddest, most heartbreaking expression before turning on his heel and wandering off in search of… something. 

“What are you looking for?” Francis asked one day when he found his older brother standing at the docks and staring at the sand, his toes nearly touching but not quite, _not quite_. “If you want to be on the beach so badly, simply go.” 

“I shouldn’t.” Wade said numbly, almost woodenly, his entire body angled towards the water though his feet stayed firmly planted on the wooden slats. “I shouldn’t go down there but I don’t know why. I’ve forgotten something but I don’t know what.” 

His blue eyes were dim, almost gray when he turned to Francis. “Do you know what it feels like to finally have everything you looked for your entire life, then to have that thing carved out of your soul and tossed into the ocean to forever keep you away from them?” 

“I…” Francis hesitated. “No? What is it that was tossed into the ocean?” 

“I don’t know.” Wade turned back to the water, to the endless seas and slowly rolling waves. “Christ, I don’t know but something is out there. I left something out there and if I don’t find it, I’ll go insane.” 

...The Prince was going insane and everyone knew it. 

A month and then two passed since the wreck and life returned to normal. Ships went back to sea and sailors returned to the ships as the worst of the winter storms abated and heavy clouds temporarily lifted from the horizon. The holiday season was approaching and inside the castle a feast was planned, a massive tree dragged into the great hall, a steer and a boar killed to serve as main courses for the upcoming parties. 

The entire world seemed to forget about the _Sister Margaret_ , about the lives ended too soon, and about the Prince and whatever had so thoroughly _ruined_ him. 

The once brash warrior was nothing more than a shell of his former self, quiet when he used to be loud, miserable when he used to quick with a snarky comment or teasing remark. Heavy muscles gave way to leaner lines as Wade quit training with the soldiers, his hair lost its shine and dark circles sank under his eyes as Wade went days without proper sleep or food. Anger and irritation flared brighter and faster than before, but then extinguished to nothing _nothing_ when he couldn’t muster the energy for a proper response. 

Though he’d never engaged in _casual_ dalliances the Prince had always enjoyed the platonic company of those who visited the castle but after the _Sister Margaret_ , Wade kept to his rooms and to his balcony, choosing the silence of the night sky and sound of the wind over the clamor of conversation and laughter. 

There was a song in Wade’s head he couldn’t shake, a melody in the key of loneliness, a solo in the key of empty, and no matter how many times he played it out on the piano or sang it to the blank walls of his bedchamber, he never remembered the name, the origin, the ending. It simply went round and round in his head, wrapping tight around his heart and echoing through the achingly empty spot Wade had always thought his soul would reside. 

_When had he lost his soul?_

...The Prince was going insane, and the entire Kingdom knew it. 

At night Wade closed his eyes and dreamed of drowning, dreamed of sinking beneath choppy waves and filling his boots fill with icy water. He dreamed of clawing upwards but being dragged below, he dreamed of too sharp nails cutting as they clutched him, he dreamed of laughter that was akin to a death toll, he dreamed of breathing salt water and tasting it on his lips, dreamed of blood smeared on his tongue and the _click click click_ of scales as they slid beneath his fingers. 

At night Wade dreamed of _drowning_ and sometimes when he woke up, he wished he’d never woken at all. Other times he woke and stumbled to the window to push his forehead to the glass and stare at the ocean as if something was calling him.

As if _someone_ was calling him. 

“Get some air.” Thomas told him when Wade started to get too obviously _off_ , when he got broody and quiet and visiting dignitaries looked at him sideways and disapproving. He was frustrated that his son hadn’t just snapped out of it, irritated that Wade’s depression still lingered. _Why couldn’t Wade just be happy again?_ “Walk it off and come back in here the man and Prince I raised you to be. Go get some air.” 

So Wade went and got some air. He hummed tunelessly as he walked the well worn path the docks and then further to the beach, staying to the rocks instead of the sand, leaning far over to look into the tidepools but never leaning too close lest he got wet and--

\--and _what_? What would happen if he dipped his fingers into the ocean water? If he flattened his palms to the surface of the sea or plunged his head beneath the waves or jumped from the cliffs by the castle and let the currents take him? 

The Prince wasn’t suicidal. He didn’t want to die. But he wanted something else than what was standing here on solid ground. He wanted to be where someone else was. He wanted to see--- he wanted to _see_. 

_Get some air._ Thomas always told him. _Snap out of it._ But Wade couldn’t snap out of it. He couldn’t shake the overwhelming awful that he didn’t belong in the places he’d always belonged. That he was different now and no one else could tell. That the place where his soul should be was somewhere out on the waves and beneath the stars. 

He wanted to _see_ and he wanted to _know_ and the castle was _stifling_ , so Wade went wandering alone. 

And one day in his wanderings, in his attempt to get some air and feel _normal_ again, Wade saw a beautiful sea shell lying in a tide pool. It was turned half on it’s side, buried in the semi shifting sand and gleaming _golden_ in what was left of the sunset’s weakening light. 

_Golden_ and marred through with delicate lines, scratches from being tossed and scraped along with the tide as it rose and fell along the rocks, lacy and spiderwebbed and intricate. 

It was _golden_ and gorgeous and the Prince crouched down by the tide pool and reached for the shell before he thought about it, dipped his hand into the freezing water without hesitating, didn’t notice he’d left the boardwalk to walk in the sand until he closed his fingers around the shell and tried to pull it out of the water and hold it up to the light. 

But the second he touched the water, in the same breath that he touched sand and then sea, there was _music_. _Music_ in Wade’s ears, faint and almost ethereal and he jerked back from the water and looked around wildly, scanned the empty beachfront for anyone who might have whistled the damnable tune, who might have sang a few notes or plucked the strings on an unexpected instrument. 

But there was no one. There was nothing. The beach was as empty as it had been when the Prince came to walk it, as empty as it always was for this particular stretch was far from the ships at berth, far from the fisherman as they lined up boxes of the daily catch to sell. This part of the beach was desolate and rocky, brow beaten by unchecked winds from the west, thrashed at the shoreline by the tide stirred choppy by rocks in the harbor. 

There was no one who might have been responsible for the music that had sprang so quickly to his mind, but Wade looked around again all the same before reaching slowly slowly back into the water for the golden shell that called him with its glitter. 

_Music_ again, louder than before and Wade’s head jerked back, his mouth fell open and eyes slammed shut as the melody swirled through his consciousness and touched something broken in his subconscious, welled up in his heart and hovered just behind his lips as if he needed to speak specific words and bring _something_ into being. 

The Prince was brought to tears but he didn’t know why, behind his closed eyes he saw flickering _gold_ and dark blue cut webbed through with ruby red, the shell cut sharp into his head and he had a flash of arousal, of pain and desire mixed into a bite that throbbed out from the side of his throat.

And there was _music_ , calling to him the longer he sat with his hands in the water, so the Prince simply sat and listened and let the fragmented parts of his memory come back to the surface bit by bit, inch by inch, piece by jagged, uncertain, not quite whole piece. 

_Gold. Glitter. Blue. Red. Music._

The servants came for Wade that night, came down to the beach with a blanket to put around his shoulders to ease his trembling. They pulled him away from a long empty tide pool, helped him stand when Wade’s legs didn’t want to work after kneeling for so long. 

The Prince was put to bed with a hot water bottle to soothe the chills, with a night potion to help him sleep and quiet his feverish mumbling, and a message delivered to the King that spoke of creeping insanity, of a danger to the throne, of what could be done about the rules of succession and whether or not Francis would be eligible to take over as Crown Prince. 

“What do you know about mermaids?” Wade asked a servant the next morning when he finally woke from a fitful sleep and found them stoking the bedroom fireplace. “What do you know about _mermaids_?” 

“They are water demons, my Prince.” came the soft answer. “Sirens and murderers. They stay by the rocks so when ships crash they can lure soldiers to the depths with their songs. Those who can’t be lured are dragged away screaming, those who take the creatures up on the promise of pleasure have their hearts taken from their chest. They are evil.” 

“But what if they aren’t?” 

“You’ll forgive me for saying so, my Prince. But the mermaids are always evil.” 

_But what if they aren’t?_

*********

The castle had a library that rivaled even the ancient temples in the mountains, walls filled end to end with shelves, a copy of every book printed in the territory and several from the furthest reaches of the known world.

There was poetry from the masters, novels from classical writers whose words had shaped generations, religious texts meant to change hearts and inspire followers to greatness. Romantic writings the adolescents would sneak and read, arousing texts that were deemed appropriate only _after_ marriage lest wondering eyes and innocent hearts learn of passions untoward. 

Collections of fiery speeches from history’s best royals and commanders, song lyrics from the bards and musicians, a nearly sacred collection of traditional recipes from the oldest grandmothers. An entire section that was architectural plans and blueprints, another that was detailed maps of the region from crop rotations to the paths the rivers took after the floods. 

There were painstakingly rendered miniatures of the best paintings, detailed instructions for the creation of a harp or lyre, the piano or the majestic organ that brought the more pious to morning prayers. A schematic for the bells in the towers, one of the only remaining texts that spoke of the old religions and the ways they worshipped nature, and in the furthest corner of the library was a whole shelf dedicated solely to _monsters_.

The legend of the Hydra was one reserved for the spooky nights close to the harvest, and the stories of angels and cherubs guarding children’s sleep were read on Sunday mornings. There were novels and research on the massive tentacles beasts of the deep, myths and first hand accounts of run ins with whales ten times the size of a ship, sharks that could swallow a sailor whole, sea serpents that wrapped around a mast and splintered it in its coils.

And then there were the books about the _mers_. Sea demons and seductive sirens. Man eaters and sailor saviors. Scantily dressed mermaids and fanged, ferocious mermen that either lured their unsuspecting prey to the depths with their beauty or simply reached with clawed fingers and took their next meal right out of a rowboat. 

“Mer mer mer mer mer.” Wade whispered to himself as he swept every one of the books from the shelf and tumbled them to the floor then searched through the scattered pile for that one _specific_ book he remembered reading as a child, that one _specific_ story his Ma used to tell him on nights when the storms raged outside the window and he couldn’t sleep. 

It had been about found love and that same love shunned, about a sea nymph that gave up her magic to follow a Prince onto land only to have the Prince reject her when she was no longer mystical. It had been a sad story, one of heartbreak and pettiness, about what could go wrong when what seemed to be fate turned out to only be fleeting desire and quickly waning interest. 

But there had been something in the story, something about a witch and a wish granted, a trade made between sea nymph and sorceress that ensured she could walk to find her love and then run to throw herself into the waves when he rejected her. It was something about revenge striking the Prince down later, about the sea nymph turning to foam on the waves because her broken heart wouldn’t heal. 

Admittedly, it wasn’t a story with a happily ever after attached to it, but Wade’s Ma had always just smiled and murmured, “Tis better to have loved and lost, than to never love at all.” 

As a child Wade had been cranky and obstinate, demanding to know _why_ it was better to have loved and lost, screeching about how the sea nymph should have eaten his heart so it would always be hers anyway, swinging his little sword and announcing he would _never_ love…

… and thirty some years later the Prince had grown to a man who didn’t believe in a love strong enough to be worth grieving for, who thought the easiest way to bury his feelings was to carve them in bloody strikes into someone else’s torso, who thought he would never ever love and at the same time was so painfully aware that he must have loved otherwise his heart wouldn’t be breaking with every lonely, damnable breath. 

“Were you and Ma soulmates?” Wade asked wearily when King Thomas came to find him later that night. It was cold in the library, dark after the sun had set hours ago and since no one knew the Prince was among the bookshelves, no one had come to light a lamp and Wade hadn’t mustered the energy to do it himself. 

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Thomas lit a lamp, sighed out loud when he saw the scattered books and bent to start picking them up since the servants were already in bed. “Soulmates aren’t real, and even if they were, we Kings and Princes don’t have the luxury of marrying for love. We marry for duty, for the better of the Kingdom, and to ensure a line of inheritance. You know this already.” 

“Soulmates aren’t real.” Wade repeated. “How can you say that?” 

“How can you say otherwise?” the King shrugged and straightened the book on the shelves. “You’ve rarely even taken a lover, Wade. Never a relationship, never a long term bed partner. You would rather fight than talk, rather wage war than contemplate a marriage. Why does it matter and why do you care? What would you know about the ways souls can meld and hearts can beat together--” 

“--and the way a smile is sunshine in the bitterest of storms.” the Prince finished the quote, a line from one his Ma’s favorite stories from so many years ago, the corner of his mouth lifting in a tired smile. “Remember when Ma used to read that poem all the time?” 

“Vividly.” Thomas allowed. “But t’was nothing but a silly fantasy.” 

“It sounds like a fairy tale.” Wade acknowledged softly, wistfully, “But what if it isn’t? What if the mer’s aren’t all vicious man eaters and a heart song is-- is--” he fell silent, thumped his head against the bookshelf in quiet frustration and closed his eyes. “Never mind, I don’t know where I was going with that. Can’t seem to keep my mind right these days.” 

“Hmmm.” The King’s agreement was not unkind, but Wade flinched from it anyway and after a moment Thomas asked, “Where did you learn that phrase? Heart song?” 

“I don’t know.” Wade’s laugh was broken, bitter and brittle as he finally put words to everything that had tormented him for weeks and weeks and _weeks_ now. “I don’t-- I don’t know anything anymore. I’m hearing music in my head, voices in my dreams. I keep wishing I could walk right off my balcony and drown, want to run a ship into the rocks again just to figure out what happened that night.” 

“Hush.” Thomas sent a furtive glance around the empty library, stepped closer and lowered his voice to order, “You cannot speak of things like suicide. If someone hears you, there will be rumours you are unfit for rule and that could cause all manner of unrest in the Kingdom. It’s already bad enough the alliance negotiations failed, if word gets around that our best soldier is having a breakdown, our enemies will grow bold, the safety of our borders will be compromised and we will be at risk for invasion! _Hush_!” 

“I don’t care about the crown or the war.” The Prince curled forward over his knees, hid his face in his arms. “I don’t care about the enemies at the borders or the soldiers training in the yard. Not anymore.” 

“Wade--” 

“I hear music in my head.” Wade repeated, dull and empty and lifeless, his blue eyes nearly gray with blank despair. “Can’t get rid of it. My heart hurts and when I close my eyes I see _gold_ and blue and red. I heard a voice that I can’t place, I am missing someone I have never known. Father, I am--” 

His voice cracked. “ _Dad_. I’m losing my mind.” 

“Don’t say that!” 

“I’m losing my mind.” Barely a whisper, the words muffled into Wade’s arms as he curled into a tighter ball there at the bottom of the empty bookshelf, the books about soulmates and mermaids and monsters spread around his feet. “Maybe-- maybe if I lose it entirely I’ll find what I keep looking for.” 

….the Prince was losing his mind, and the entire Kingdom knew it. 

He’d come back from the journey across the sea different and it was impossible to hide, he’d come back from the shipwreck changed and no matter how King Thomas tried to keep Wade out of the public eye and started grooming Francis to take over the throne instead, rumours abounded and secrets were whispered in dark halls and the women cut their eyes uncertainly at Wade whenever he passed. 

On Thomas’s orders, plain clothes guards followed Wade in his aimless wanders around the Kingdom, extra vigilant anytime the Prince strayed too close to the water, giving quiet reports of the way Wade would crouch and put his hands into tide pools, the way he would hold any shell remotely _golden_ and his expression would twist in anguish. 

“He isn’t well.” the advisors murmured into the King’s ear. “Perhaps a priest? Perhaps a healer? Perhaps even… even the witch.” 

“Never the witch.” Thomas swore, his face washing pale. “Never ever the witch. Don’t even suggest such a thing. Her name isn’t allowed to be spoken within these castle walls, she’s wrought enough grief on my family as it is.” 

….the witch’s name was _Shiklah_ , though no one ever said it anymore. Her name was _Shiklah_ , but since the day her potions had killed the Queen instead of healing her, since that fateful moment when the King demanded a miracle and the witch had been unable to change what the gods had deemed irreversible, no one said her name. 

She’d been banished to the far cliffs, shunned from the cities and villages. King Thomas couldn’t kill her, couldn’t risk the witch’s wrath by removing her from the Kingdom’s borders but he could push her outside of the reaches of civilization. A punishment of twenty years was hardly time at all to a centuries old witch, but it was more than enough time for her anger to fester and bitterness to grow, enough to let her rage towards the Royal family turn into something black and horrible and _possessed_. 

No one said her name anymore, but on a cold day when the sun shone too bright and the wind blew too sharp, the Kingdom’s Crown Prince slipped away from the ever present guards and ran his horse into the hills, past the last edges of civilization and up to where the trees grew scraggly and the flowers withered away and it was _there_ that the witch heard her name from someone else’s lips for the first time in twenty years. 

“Witch Shiklah.” Wade slid from Arthur’s back and strode--stumbled--all but _fell_ on his way to the stone hut that housed the Kingdom’s most fearsome sorceress. She was out at her fire pit with a cauldron of boiling water, sheets and clothing soaking in the scalding, soapy mix, the rising steam hiding her expression from the Prince until he was too close to turn back, and by the time Wade made it to her hearth, he was too _desperate_ to turn back. 

“Witch Shiklah.” Wade said again, and stopped a few feet away, waiting for the women to acknowledge him. “I’ve come to ask a favor.” 

“It has been a long time since anyone said my name.” she didn’t look up from her laundry. “And I certainly did not expect it to be King Thomas’s eldest son, the Crown Prince of this accursed Kingdom.” 

A beat of silence, then eerie yellow eyes peered through the steam to get a closer look at Wade. “You look like your mother, do you know? Blond. Beautiful. You come asking a favor, but I suspect you are here to kill me as revenge for taking her from you. I will tell you the same thing I told your father-- I cannot concoct a miracle from what the god’s will. She was meant to die and nothing I did could have changed it.” 

“Be warned, Prince.” she continued, when Wade didn’t answer. “I allowed your father to banish me only because I understand the rage borne of love lost. But if you raise a hand to me, I’ll end you where you stand and your father the King won’t have even a bone to bury, do you understand?” 

Wade swallowed and nodded his head, and the witch’s eyes narrowed curiously when the Prince swayed on his feet, put a hand to his temple like it was taking all of his energy just to stay upright and conscious. 

“...something is wrong.” She decided, and twenty years of anger burbled forth into a satisfied laugh. “By the gods, are you sick as well and your father sent you to me for a cure? Prince I will _not_ cure you. I’d rather see the line of succession end than offer my help. I might not have cursed your father for banishing me but I will not help--” 

“Do you believe in soulmates?” Wade interrupted, jolted forward and held pleading hands out to the witch. “Do you believe in soulmates? Because I-- I do. And I think I met mine but I can’t remember them and I’m going mad trying to figure out how to find them and I need your help. I need your help.” 

“Soulmates.” Shiklah pushed coal black hair behind her shoulders and straightened to her full, almost terrifying height. “You came all this way, up the mountain to my home to ask me about _soulmates_.” 

“To ask you to help me find mine.” Wade whispered desperately. “I know you hate my family but this has nothing to do with my father, with my Ma, nothing like that. I have to find them and I know you can help.” 

“Even if I wanted to help you--” 

“No, you _have_ to help me.” Wade went to his knees at the witch’s feet, clutched at the dirt and ash and clenched his fists until his nails bit white into his palms. “You have to help me Shiklah. I don’t know who my soulmate is or why I keep dreaming about mers but you have to help me. I’m losing my mind. I’m losing my _mind_.” 

“Child.” Shiklah curled her lip in disdain and stepped away from the Prince. “You don’t know who your soulmate is because mortals do not _have_ soulmates, only those of us with a penchant for living centuries have enough of a presence to attract another’s soul. You dream of mers because all men are the same and want magic and otherworldly beauty up till the point a creature becomes human to love you, and then you want nothing to do with her. You human men are petty and disgusting and I won’t help you.” 

“I dream of drowning.” the Prince whispered, and Shiklah’s eyes flared purple in sudden, knowing surprise. _The Prince had found a mer?_ “I spend my days at tide pools because the seas paralyze me but I cannot stay away from the water. I hear music in my head, in my mind, in my soul but when I try to play it, it’s only noise and when I try to sing it--” 

“--it’s simply chaos.” the witch finished softly, almost sadly. “Tell me, Prince. Are you drawn to golden shells?” 

“Until my hands bleed from holding the edges.” Wade held up his hands so she could see the scars. “Do you know what this means?” 

And Shiklah thought back decades, thought back _centuries_ to the time when her heart had sang a song of mates, when she had followed the one she loved onto land and gave up her magic to be close, then found herself alone and rejected and standing by the tide pools with tears in her eyes because she could never go home. 

_By the gods, she missed her home._

“...I know what it means.” she finally answered, and in that moment she could have shared pity with the clearly heart broken Prince, she could have given sympathy and empathy and understanding Wade wouldn’t find anywhere else. In that moment Shiklah could have given Wade answers and reassurance and perhaps even _help_. 

But hell hath no fury, as the saying goes and most of those sayings were writ by men who had shown unbelievable _arrogance_ in tangling with a creature like Shiklah and the ones she used to call sisters, words scribbled by men with shaking hands and endless nightmares after they tried to cross the wrong witch. 

_Hell hath no fury_ , and though it had been centuries since Shiklah’s lover had spurned her human form, even though it had been decades since the King had banished her for something she had no hope of accomplishing, revenge was the sweetest morsel to the mouth that had ever been cooked in Hel and Shiklah had waited so so long for her revenge. 

So yes, she could have offered the desperate Prince some sort of relief, perhaps a potion to numb his mind and erase the memories, or even a gentle word of encouragement to stay steady on and this too would pass. 

But instead Shiklah smiled a terrible smile and cupped Wade’s chin in her clawed fingers, purring down at him all too sweet, “My Prince. I will give you a chance to find your mate. I will allow you to go where your mate is, to seek them in the places a human cannot normally go. Is this what you want?” 

“I’ll-- I’ll do anything.” Wade closed his palms around her thin wrist, pressed lightly, gratefully. “I’ll do anything to find my soulmate. Tell me what to do.” 

“Come to my witching tree.” she turned on silent feet and moved towards the ancient, twisted tree growing closest to the cliff side, gnarled branches reaching towards the sky and roots tangled as it clung to the sheer drop. “Come along, Prince. I’ll help you find who you are looking for.” 

Wade followed her without thought, ignored the instincts to turn back and run away from the witch, set aside his father’s admonitions that no one was to ever go to Shiklah, pushed back the wiggle of unease in his spine over so dangerous a creature being so willing to help. 

Wade followed and ignored all of that because he was hearing _music_ again and it was tearing at his heart, his vision was fogging over as a headache set in sharp and throbbing behind his temples. He hadn’t slept in days, hadn’t eaten in days and he was weak, he was _weak_ and he needed answers so he followed the witch towards the menacing tree and stood swaying in exhaustion as she readied her books and spells. 

“You would give anything to find your mate?” she queried, whisking away the cloth that covered her charmed mirror. “Anything at all?” 

“I’d trade my life just to know them for a moment more.” Wade promised, sinking to his knees again and peering into the cloudy glass when she motioned him forward.

“But what if it cost you your beauty to find them?” Shiklah raised finely arched eyebrows. “Or your charms? Do you think your soulmate would love you if you weren’t so lovely?” 

“I--” Wade’s mouth pulled down in a frown, but when his eyes fell shut he saw _gold_ and heard a laugh that made his heart nearly burst, so he nodded, nodded and wet his lips and whispered, “Yes. _Yes_ they would love me even if I weren’t beautiful. They would. They’re my soulmate.” 

“Do not look away from the mirror.” the witch instructed. “You must know yourself and your own soul for this work, so stare deep into the glass until you find what you are looking for.” 

The Prince shifted forward and stared into the glass and Shiklah felt just a split second of remorse, the slightest twinge of sadness because she so clearly remembered a time where _she’d_ been foolish enough to give up everything of herself for what she thought was love. 

The Prince was endlessly foolish to think a mer was his soulmate, endlessly _stupid_ to come to a witch such as herself for help finding the mer. The oceans were fathomless, the deeps unable to be navigated and if the mer had gone to warmer waters for the winter, there was no chance the Prince would ever find them, even if he thought he was hearing their heartsong in his mind. 

Death would be a kinder fate than the one the Prince was resigning himself to, and Shiklah allowed herself just the one bit of sadness before she set to work with the potion. It was not her job to convince mortals away from idiotic choices, it was not her responsibility to guide the Crown Prince away from certain doom.

He had asked for help, she would state her price and if the Prince accepted then it was his own damn fault. 

“Focus on the mirror.” she ordered again, then leaned over and snipped a piece of blond hair from Wade’s head, muttered to herself as she crushed flower petals the same shade of blue as Wade’s eyes into her bowl. Acidic water from the thermal pools, the stain of lily pollen, blackthorn and a hint of hemlock if only to keep things _traditional_. 

“Your mate won’t come to you, you will have to go to them.” Shiklah said quietly, and the Prince’s answer was nothing more than a hum. Wade didn't know it, but the mirror had hypnosis written into the fine scratches along the surface, runes and hexes carved into the frame and staring too long caused ones mind to wander, left them susceptible and easily swayed. He was already so close to gone, hovering on the edge of unconscious simply from lack of sleep and proper food and a few minutes staring into the charmed glass had erased what was left of the Prince’s self awareness and control. 

“I will take your heart song.” Sulfur rose acrid and terrible from the bowl as she knelt beside Wade and offered it up to him. “It belongs to a human, and since I will make you not quite human to find your mate, you can no longer have it. Your song. Give it to me.” 

“I--” Wade swayed, faltered, breathed in the sulfur and nodded. “ _Yes_.” 

The song rose from his chest, tore from his heart, lingered in the air like mist and Wade watched with unseeing eyes as the witch brought her fingers through the sacred mist and then slashed it to pieces with her claws. 

_There was no need for that anymore._

“How--” the Prince’s voice was deep, slow. “How will they know me without my heart song?” 

“If you are truly soulmates, they will know you.” Shiklah held the bowl to Wade’s lips so he would drink. “They will know you without your charm--” 

“Yes.” 

“--without your beauty.” 

“--yes.” 

“--without your song.” 

“ _Yes_.” 

One last swallow and Wade’s eyes fell shut as the potion flowed thick and sluggish through his veins, and Shiklah leaned close to bare her fangs at his ear and hiss, “Heart songs aren’t the only things the waves and currents carry, my Prince. The terrors of the deep will speak and shriek too. You have three cycles of the moon to find your mate, then the ones that scream in the depths will rise up for your mind, for your body, for your soul.” 

The witch got to her feet and tossed the bowl aside carelessly, snapped her fingers once, twice and whispered a command so the curse would activate--

\-- and Wade’s eyes flew open wide, his mind jolted to full coherence, his thought process whole and in tact for the first time in months--

\--just in time to see himself turn into a monster. 

First it was his skin, and Wade screamed and screamed and _screamed_ as the sun was suddenly searing, peeling at his skin and burning it away as blisters burst at the surface and left open, ugly, bleeding wounds. Then it was his hair falling out in chunks, piles of blond hitting the ground and charring to ash, eyelashes and eyebrows fanning away to nothing. 

The next wave of pain started at his feet and Wade fell back onto his rear in horror as his feet twisted and contorted, as bones broke and reshaped and not the sound of his pleas nor the tears coursing down his face and stinging the wounds helped _anything_ when his ankles molded at the bone. His calves were next, warping together as his skin turned black and wound up to his thighs and the Prince struggled, he struggled and shouted and beat at the ground in helpless anguish as he was forcefully, painfully _changed_. 

It was a tail, he had a _tail_ and the scales were midnight black, stark against the bloody red of his damaged and destroyed torso and Wade kept staring at himself in the mirror and _screaming_ as the witch took his charm, his beauty, his everything and transformed him into something hideous and not quite human. His eyes flared brilliant blue then faded to dull brown, there were gills at his neck and suddenly every breath was torture, his lungs working to gasp through dry air when he needed to be in the water. He was scorched and parched and dying in the sunlight and the witch was _laughing_ at him. 

“Does it hurt?” Shiklah asked mockingly. “Does the sun hurt your skin? When I learned to walk on land, it felt like knives in my feet every step but I was willing to go through it for the man I loved. He loved to see me dance so though it felt like a knife through my body, I danced for him every night. When he married another I threw myself into the waves hoping to turn to foam and waste away, but the ocean herself rejected me, spat me back on land to suffer here alone. Tell me Prince, are you willing to suffer this way for the one you love?” 

“Help me!” Wade cried, cutting at his lips with newly formed fangs. “Help me! What have you done to me!” 

“I told you I’d give you a chance like no other to find your mate.” the witch pulled away from his grasping hands, curled her lips in disgust when fresh wounds broke out on his too sensitive skin and the newly-turned-mermaid _shouted_ in agony. “This is your chance. I hope you know how to swim, Prince.” 

“No no no please-- Please---!” 

A swift kick to the midsection rebroke only recently healed ribs, and Wade’s cry cut off abruptly when he suddenly couldn’t _breathe_. He hunched away from the sun and held onto his ribs and the witch kicked him again, again until the cursed mer slid on the loose rocks and tumbled over the side of the cliff, plunging helpless and hurt towards the sea. 

The branches and rocks on the way down tore at him, cut dark red lines into the midnight black scales until Wade’s tail was just as cut up and ruined as his body and when he hit the surface of the water and sank below, the saltwater seeped into the cuts and nearly stopped his heart with white hot _pain_. 

The Prince had dreamed of drowning just last night but this wasn’t like his dream.

This time there were no golden eyes to greet him, no reaching hands and quiet laugh to hold him close and pull him to shore. 

Wade was alone and he was _drowning_ , and he was screaming too loud to hear the faintest strains of his soulmates heart song twisting in the currents. 

He was drowning, and up on the cliffs the witch just laughed and laughed and laughed. 

_I hope you can swim, Prince._

_************_

**Chapter Notes:**

_I kept thinking about Deadpool 2 and the scenes where Wade tries so hard to die just so he can see Vanessa for a second in the afterlife, and that’s the sort of desperation I tried to write into the chapter. Wade being so desperate for answers that he contemplates drowning just to find them is so heartbreaking ugh._

_[SHIKLAH](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shiklah) is such an interesting, cursed character and I love her in this fic. The OG story of the **[LITTLE MERMAID](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Little_Mermaid)** is honestly horrifying, and I loved it for Shiklah’s back story because yay for tying in multiple verses, right? _

_I love the curse-- the threat of voices from the deep coming for Wade ie:: his voices in the comics and three moon cycles to reference the three days the little mermaid was given in the story to get the Prince to love her._

_Remember! Feedback fuels the writers soul! I_

_Remember! Comments fuel the writers soul!_


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is so intense!   
> Applicable Warnings: Typical Deadpool body horrorish things as he adjusts to being a mirror, a description of eating fish that might ick out some non meat eaters, a moment where Wade thinks Peter is being hurt, but it's a misunderstanding and then of course, a Happily Ever After with a post credit scene I had to physically stop myself from expanding on. 
> 
> See end of chapter notes for fun stuff!

Not drowning was the most terrifying thing Wade had ever experienced. 

It wasn’t just the crush of water, though it weighed on him like an anvil. The water was heavy, it was so _heavy_ like a vice around Wade's chest squeezing the life from him with every hitched breath, physically tight around broken ribs and nearly punctured internal organs, but that wasn’t the worst part. 

It wasn’t the horror of trying to kick his legs and remembering he didn’t have _legs_ anymore, that his body had been broken and forced and molded into a tail Wade didn’t know how to use and that’s why he kept sinking, he just kept _sinking_ but that wasn’t the worst part. 

It wasn’t the way the Prince hurt over every inch of his body, the way the water tinted red as sun damaged skin peeled off and cuts and abrasions from the cliff side bled into the stinging salt water. Wade could handle the pain, he could close his eyes and not see the ruined, black and bloody scales, and that wasn’t the worst part. 

It was the _not_ _drowning_ that was the worst part. It was the desperate, panicky grasp for self control because Wade was human even if he wasn’t human any more, and he knew not to breathe. He knew not to give in to the burning in his lungs and the way his brain screamed for _oxygen_ , he knew not to gasp and wheeze and _breathe_ because then he would drown and then it was worse, it was the worst, it was the worst, it was the worst because Wade had to _breathe_ \--

\--the gills on his neck opened up to inhale and Wade heard the sickening shift of newly formed flesh and his mouth opened in the same motion because he had to breathe and the worst of it, the _worst_ of it was how good it felt. 

_Gills_ and it meant the Prince hadn’t dreamed the moment with Shiklah, that the pain coursing through his veins was real and the near mangled tail below his waist was real and the way he was gasping through oxygen rich water was _real_. 

He wasn’t dreaming and he wasn’t drowning and somehow, that was the worst of it all. 

Three cycles of the moon, Shiklah had said. Wade had three moon cycles to find his mate and as the newly turned mer sank to a ledge beneath the surface of the sea, as he landed weighted and stunned to stillness against the rocks, Wade looked up and up at the last, weak rays of sunlight filtering down from above and knew he was _doomed_. 

How. How could he do this? Every breath through his gills was torture, agony to Wade’s mind and his consciousness because it was wrong but it was so real. His legs hurt like they had when he’d grown too quickly as an adolescent, they hurt like after he’d hiked miles and miles up the mountains on a campaign of conquering and they hurt when Wade dragged his torn hands down the scales and made his palms bleed anew because he rubbed the wrong way and shredded himself on too sharp edges. 

His legs hurt but his legs weren’t there anymore and Wade stared at the claws that had formed from his fingernails and thought for one horrifying, hysterical moment that maybe he could tear the tail, scratch it to shreds and peel the scales back and he would have _feet_ again. 

_Breathe_ and Wade clamped his hands onto the gills to force it to stop because it was disgusting. 

_Breathe_ and he bit his lip to try and hide a whimper but then cursed out loud when his fangs punched right through the tender skin and added to the wounds multiplying on his body. 

Three cycles of the moon, Shiklah had said and then the voices from the deep would come for his heart and his soul and his mind. But hearing voices couldn’t be worse than the _nothing_ Wade could hear now, right?

There was nothing to hear. Not the sound of water, because he was submerged and couldn’t hear the waves. Not birds in the trees or wind through the grasses or the cries of seagulls. Not music from the temples or his family murmuring in the halls of the castle, not the soft whinny from Arthur, not the sounds of a crackling fire or even the clang of weapon on weapon in the heart of the fight. 

There was _nothing_ , not the sound of his soulmate’s song, not even his own heart beat. 

_Nothing_. And Wade was no where. And he was no one because monsters weren’t really anyone at all, were they?

Three cycles of the moon, Shiklah had said and the Prince lay crumpled and motionless along the ledge beneath the surface for far too long. The sun’s rays passed barely golden through water this deep, slipping over Wade’s black scales and lighting the red cuts for a brief moment before they were gone. It was cold, he was so _cold_ and all he could do was lie with eyes shut tight as what was left of the winter sun passed by him two, three, maybe even four times. 

Two, three, maybe even four days came and went as the mer lay in pain, huddled and shaking and muffling cries into his palm. Time had no meaning beneath the sea and Wade didn’t know how to clock the hours when he was hurt, when he was hiding, when he was alone. 

He didn’t even know his soulmate’s name. He didn’t even know his soulmate’s _name_ or how to find them and now when Wade closed his eyes he didn’t see gold, he only saw black. He didn’t hear music, he only heard screams. He didn’t think of laughter and love and sharp tipped kisses, he thought of horror and nightmares and fangs cutting him deep. 

Death would have been a kinder fate than this and Wade looked to the watery skies and wished he could drown. 

********

Eventually the Prince had to move. 

No, eventually the Prince had to _learn_ how to move, to change everything about how he thought his body should function and change it so he could swim.

Because mers swam and Wade-- Wade was a mer now.

The sun came and went for several awful days as Wade ventured off from his ledge and tried to maneuver about. His shoulders strained near to breaking as it took him _ages_ to figure out how to use his tail for everything instead of his arms. Short swims around his ledge made Wade’s core burn with the effort of beating his tail, of moving his body just right to propel himself forward.

It was damn near impossible and the effort was exhausting and when the Prince collapsed back onto the rocks for rest, he was never sure if he was actually sleeping or if he’d slipped unconscious and near death. 

And then one day when the sunlight was barely there, Wade discovered the _currents_. There were thousands of them winding around his rocky outcropping and if he put his hand out and held very still he could feel them moving every which way, so perhaps if Wade could simply connect to one, the water would do the work of swimming for him. 

That day Wade took one last look at the rocky ledge, towards the surface he wasn’t strong enough to swim up to yet, and slid into the currents to let them take him away. 

The winter was coming on hard now and the ocean was slowly freezing behind Wade, so Nature herself chose which way to take the cursed mer. The warmer currents were stronger than the cold and Wade drifted in them uncertainly as the sea carried him south towards tropical waters. 

The currents were both a blessing and a relief, because Wade couldn’t think about the intimate horror of gills, the awkwardness of his tail and the devastation of his once clear skin, he couldn’t think about where to begin looking for his soulmate and _also_ think about how to swim and where to go all at the same time. 

The currents took the question of _where_ and _how_ from him, and now the Prince was free to rest in the water and think about a soulmate he still couldn’t quite remember. 

The _gold_ had come back to his resting moments, flashes of molten eyes and a pieced together memory of quiet laughs and gentle, adoring touches. It was so much after the days of nothing, but it wasn’t enough at the same time. Wade still didn’t know a name, he couldn’t pin down an actual moment or fully remember the press of lips to his own or the color of glitter he thought may have been dusted across beautiful skin. 

He was wandering the sea lost and alone and with only fragments of memory and scattered remnants of hope that amounted to nothing. 

He had _nothing_. 

Eventually Wade’s wounds stopped bleeding. The cuts on his tail thinned over first and then slower, the ruin on his abdomen and up his arms. The salt water stalled any attempt at scabbing, but eventually the gashes and scrapes simply formed scar tissue and sealed over completely, settling as scars all over Wade's torso. They were thick and raised in some places, rough and wide in others and as Wade’s vision adjusted to being under the sea, the damage began to look even _worse_. 

The water was blue and shifting and the light filtered over his skin as if _he_ was rippling, twisting, as if parasites were running under his skin and bugs skittered through his veins. The movement of the currents made the cuts shift and stretch and one day Wade raised his destroyed hands to his face and really _looked_ \--

\--then turned and vomited, his empty stomach heaving and churning as another wash of reality made his head spin and his mind revolt. 

_He was disgusting._

_Monstrous_. 

Trying to vomit brought to light another problem, one growing worse with every passing hour-- he was _hungry_.

Wade had barely managed a full meal a day when he was on land, too focused on finding his soulmate to worry about food but now that he was-- that he was _this_ , Wade was starving. He was ravenous. Clutching at his stomach and cutting his lips and tongue on his fangs as he ground his teeth trying to keep from howling.

He was _starving_ and Wade didn’t know how to start to fix it, how could he fix it, how could he get—

— _food_.

It was a school of fish that caught the mer's attention, bright and silver and they smelled delicious and _oh_ Wade hadn't known he could smell blood and food and feel a heartbeat through the water but there was fish and Wade was suddenly drooling, salivating, fangs aching and hands moving faster than he thought possible to reach out and snatch. 

Wade’s claws skewered the body of a fat fish as it darted past, and blood bloomed red and revolting in the water. Except it _wasn’t_ revolting, the blood looked incredible and the fish smelled incredible and the Prince sank his fangs into the meat before he could talk himself out of it. 

One bite and the fish was half devoured, another bite and it was gone. It was good, raw wet fish was _so good_ and the mer moaned low and gratified as the first taste of real protein hit his starving stomach. 

It was good but it wasn’t enough and Wade had only to think about fish, about food and about _hunting_ and suddenly he was racing through the water, body moving on instinct and teeth bared in a snarl as he chased the school of fish down and reached left then reached right and grabbed as many of the little beasts as he could.

 _Food. Blood. Good._ The tiny bones in the first mouthful stuck in his throat but Wade forced them down alongside the scales and the oddly slimy head because he was _hungry_. The next fish Wade grabbed at its head and twisted, wrenched it around and then yanked the spine free of the flesh in one quick slide so he was holding a pile of meat that he could swallow whole. 

The Prince didn’t know how long he ate, how long he tore fish apart and stuffed them in his mouth, how long he gorged on fresh meat and licked the _ick_ from his fingers, but by the time he’d eaten his fill and thought he couldn’t eat another bite, the sea floor below him was littered with skeletons and fish heads, dull scales and unseeing eyeballs. 

And then Wade stopped and stared at the mess, wiped at his mouth and licked at his lips and thought for a split second he might vomit again, but he didn’t. The mer had been _hungry_ so he hunted and feasted and now he was okay. 

_Wade was okay._

So then the mer _breathed_ , rolling his shoulders and stretching out the last of the aches from learning to swim. Wade _breathed_ and let his gills open far, gasping for oxygen laden water and reveling in the clarity it brought to his mind. His tail moved in the current idly, twitching just enough to keep him upright and Wade stayed still without any conscious thought, his mind and his new body finally syncing to the point of co-existence. 

He was still a monster. Wade was still hideous and scarred and far too ugly for his soulmate to love him but at least he was feeling whole and alive and _aware_.

The ocean floor burst into sudden colors around him as the mer’s vision sharpened and cleared. The water cascaded in shades of blue, teal and turquoise. Coral and anemones were brilliant brilliant in reds and oranges. Recesses in the rocks were the color of midnight, the blink of bright eyes as creatures swam by almost unsettingly white, starfish with all different manner of legs and textures and in colors Wade was sure didn’t exist on the surface. 

He could feel the currents, feel the way each individual one wrapped around his tail and fanned over his scales, a thousand different trails the water could take him along and it was soft like velvet over his ragged skin. Wade could read the water now, tip his head and listen to the current and feel the difference in temperature, in direction, he knew there was more food to the East and a predator somewhere North and there heading south was the scent of another mer somewhere far ahead of him. 

_Peter_. 

No, no the mer out there wasn’t Peter but the name and the _knowing_ slammed into Wade’s newly cleared mind, knocked his head back and sent him spinning in the water, arms flailing and fingers grasping at nothing as he tried to right himself. 

_Peter_. Deep dark eyes that turned golden when he smiled. A blue tail cut through with red webbing. Glitter on devastatingly beautiful skin, a laugh like the music from the temples, and a song-- a _heart song--_

Wade closed his eyes and listened, flattened his palms to the currents and strained his soul and finally he could hear it, he could hear _Peter_ , he could hear the heart song of his soulmate calling him forward forward forward and south. 

So the Prince turned into the currents and went _south_ , trusting his body and the ocean to move him through the seas, listening with his soul to the music that wove quiet and coaxing to his ears and around his mind. 

_My soulmate. I’m going to find you._

********

The first mer Wade came upon was beautiful and frail and fragile in appearance, a lovely porcelain skinned and pink tailed mer with long red hair and sea green eyes. Glitter was wrapped like fairy wings down her back and around over the curve of her shoulders and if Wade hadn’t known his soulmate was the most exquisite creature in the see, he would have stopped and stared in sheer awe at her beauty. 

As it was, the lovely mer whirled around when she felt Wade’s presence in the water and in a split second her delicate features contorted into a snarl, hissing at Wade as he came from the shadows, sharp claws and sharper teeth bared in a clear warning. 

“I don’t mean you any harm.” Wade held his hands out peacefully, tried to drop his shoulders and move back away to give her more space. “No, I don’t want to hurt you. I’m no danger, I promise.” 

“You stink of a curse.” the mer spat, green eyes wild as she stared at the _ruin_ that was Wade’s skin, the marks on his tail and the desperation in his muddy brown eyes. “You stink of a witch, and I do not want your trouble. Stay away.” 

“No wait, I just want to know if you’ve seen my mate!” The mer turned to leave and Wade lunged after her, shot through the water to try and grab at her wrist. “Please. His name is Peter and he has a blue tail with red webbing and-- AH!” 

Wade shouted in shock when the pink tail flicked out and slashed across his face, cutting over his eye and bleeding blind over his vision. “AH!”

“Next time it will be worse.” she warned, “Come towards me again and I'll tear your eyes out with my claws. Keep your curse from me, I do not want your trouble especially not on a night of a full moon. Witchcraft happens on the peak of the moon cycles, stay _away_ from me.” 

“I just need to find my mate.” Wade held a hand over his eye and tried to quell the instant rage that rose up in his chest, tried to quiet the urge to growl and snarl and _roar_ at the pretty thing. “Can you help me?” 

But the mer turned tail and fled, ignoring his plea and darting away through the water, disappearing into the darker seas ahead before Wade could orient himself enough to watch which way she went. 

His face _hurt_ , but after one deep breath and then another Wade could feel himself healing from the cut, the cut sealing over with salt water and leaving yet another scar to join the thousands of others.

He was healed but Wade still hesitated to move again, thinking back over what the mer had said before she ran from him and his monster and his curse. 

_Witchcraft happens on the peak of the moon cycles._

Three cycles of the moon, Shiklah had said and if tonight was a full moon then an entire cycle had passed and all Wade had learned to do was swim and to eat and to listen to the currents when they brought him Peter’s song. 

...except...expect Peter’s song sounded a little fainter now. The notes didn’t ring quite as strong in the water, they didn’t settle quite as gorgeous in Wade’s soul, and no matter how long he held his palms to the currents and _listened_ , Peter’s heart song stayed soft. 

...and creeping along side the song in a tinny, melancholy toll was a voice that came whispering nonsense, white noise and malevolent intent. The words amounted to nothing but it felt evil and feral and _wrong_ as it underscored the sweetened notes of his mate’s melody and Wade’s vision flickered white, milky pale white for a moment before returning to normal again. 

_White_ , and the voice from the deep kept speaking below the sound of music and it was awful. 

Three moon cycles, and tonight was a full moon. 

Wade was running out of time.

********

The currents took Wade further south with the scent of mers ahead of him in the steadily warming water, and with the knowledge that one moon cycle was already gone, Wade swam as fast as he could to get to Peter sooner, took the currents and raced them until his shoulders burned and he was exhausted again so he could keep ahead of the white voice growing louder and louder and louder. 

There was noise in his head, sometimes the Prince's vision would blur _white_ as he hunted and that was terrifying, but he always shook it off and swam faster trying to get to his soulmate. 

The second time he came across another mer, Wade started towards them and then paused, went to call out and approach but hesitated and ducked into the shadows instead to watch for a moment and see if they would be friendlier than the last. 

This one was every bit as enticing as the first pink tailed mer had been, eyes dark blue and tail brilliant gold, honestly _massive_ in size but effortlessly graceful as he moved alongside another silver tailed mer that came from the rocks and pulled them close. 

They were clearly mates, beautifully in sync with every shift of their tails and brush of their fingers, circling each other playfully and darting in for kisses that grew more and more intimate with every breath and when Wade felt awkward spying on their moment he swam forward slowly, cautiously and cleared his throat to try and interrupt. 

“That’s close enough.” the bigger one, the silver tailed one whirled around on Wade in a split second and pushed his partner behind him when Wade approached. “You stink of a _witch_ , mer. We don’t want your trouble.” 

Wade stopped still, swallowed back the instinct to growl again. The anger had been coming quicker these last few days-- weeks? It was impossible to track time beneath the waves-- and even his feeding had grown savage. He’d taken on larger and larger prey, tangled with a small shark just the other day because he was hungry and because he needed the violence and the outlet for the _rage_ that had been planted that morning with the witch and was _growing_ the longer it took him to find Peter, the longer the white voice whispered in his mind and muted the call of Peter’s heart song. 

“I’m not trying to bring trouble.” Once upon a time the mer could speak politely, diplomatically to a room full of angry royals and Wade pulled on every bit of his self control to do the same now. “I-- I know I stink of a witch, but I’m not bringing trouble. I’m simply trying to find my mate. Can you help me?” 

The golden tailed mer spoke softly to his mate, who nodded once and kept a firm distance between they and Wade as he answered, “Who is your mate, stranger?” 

“His name is Peter.” Relief temporarily quieted the white voice in Wade’s head and Peter’s song soared through his heart, lovely and coaxing and whole. “He has a blue tail cut through with red, glitter on his shoulders and dark eyes and hair. Have you seen him?” 

“We haven’t seen him.” the golden tailed one spoke from behind his partner. “But we do not gather with the mers in the warmer seas, either. If you continue south, you might find him in the communities among the islands. If he is searching for you like you are searching for him, he will find safety in numbers but linger along the outsides because he is lonely.” 

“Alright.” Wade nodded, then immediately regretted the motion when the _white_ came whispering insidious and his vision blurred milky again. “Th-thank you.” 

“You’re hurt.” the bigger mer glanced up as if he could see through the depths to the sky, then back at Wade. “The full moon on the surface might bring you some relief. Witchcraft is stronger on these nights, but we benefit from the moon goddess’s glow all the same.” 

“It’s another full moon?” The Prince asked, and the _white_ became louder when his heart beat nervously. “A—another?” 

“You can’t feel it in the currents?” the other mer asked curiously, holding out his hand and waving it through the water. “The way we are lighter, the fish slower, we are hungrier, more anxious for our mates.” 

“Your senses are blinded by missing your mate.” Dark blue eyes flickered in sympathy. “The witch we scent on you-- she forced you two apart? How long have you been alone?” 

“I don’t-- I don’t really know.” Wade drew back further into the shadows when the pair tried to get a closer look at him. “I think this is my second moon cycle since the-- the curse.” 

“You are closer to finding your mate than you realize.” the words were small comfort, but Wade clung to them anyway. “The islands are only another few weeks journey, faster if you race the currents. You will find them soon.” 

“...thank you.” Wade whispered, and he waited near the shadows until the pair had moved on, swimming in tightening circles around each other with tails brushing and hands reaching always reaching. They were beautiful in their harmony, lovely in their melodies, bodies moving to a blend of songs only _they_ could hear. 

It was beautiful and Wade felt the echo of _nothing_ through the empty pieces of his soul. He tipped his head and listened for Peter’s song and instead heard white whisperings and newly yellow despair talking over each other and clamoring in his head. 

The mer’s vision blinked white again and then sickening, sickly _yellow_ and for a moment Wade didn’t think it would clear. 

Two moon cycles had passed and it was another few weeks before he would reach the communities where the mers gathered and hopefully find his mate. 

Two moon cycles, and yellow and white noise grew louder with every heart beat until Wade could hardly hear the music at all. 

_My soulmate. I-- I think I’ll find you._

********

********

The community of mers in the islands was lovely, and most years Peter looked forward to the trek southward to join them in the clear waters and on the sandy beaches. They were safe from the humans here, free to splash and play and frolic as they wanted. Both the massive whales and the fearsome sharks called the islands home for the winters and the humans didn’t dare come close with so many beasts guarding the protected coves and brilliant lagoons. 

It was a haven compared to the colder, rockier seas of the north and many a mate match was made here in the warm currents while the mers were relaxed. Heart songs blended and forevers began with sharp kisses and grasping hands that led to quiet caves and ventures into the shade of the mangrove trees. 

It was lovely, heavenly, a paradise for creatures that were so often called demons it was easy to forget they were nearly _fae_. The water was oxygen rich and full of so many fish there was no reason to slip beyond the borders and sing a siren song of pleasure to lure the humans in close enough to bite. The air scented floral and intoxicating, flower petals lay delicate on gentle waves closest to shore and the sea moss that grew purple crumbled into aphrodisiac when it was laid to dry on the rocks in the warm sun. 

Paradise, full of beauty and song and a hazy arousal that sunk into a mer’s very skin and tinted them rose and bronze. 

Peter was gorgeous here, the glitter on his shoulders turned pink in the sun, a water lily tucked into his curls to keep them tamed and the deep blue of his tail shaded purple in the sunset. He was gorgeous but he was sad, his eyes dark and darker still as the other mers paired off around him and he was left alone. 

But he _wanted_ to be alone, Peter wanted to be solitary to hide in the darker places and lurk beneath the roots of the mangrove because so many moon cycles had passed since he’d seen his soulmate and yet the pain wouldn’t go away. 

Peter’s heart was breaking, the mer grieving with everything in his soul because he still remembered hiding there behind the rocks and watching as his Prince Charming had forgotten him. Peter had sang the siren song of forgetfulness and watched the _knowing_ drain from Wade’s crystal blue eyes, had watched his mate fight to keep him close and then fall into contented nothingness and Peter had wept tears like diamonds in the sea when they had come to take his Prince away. 

The currents had been strong that night, the moon bright and full and Peter had dove deep deep until the frigid water froze his tears, numbed his fingers and cut against his skin like ice. He didn’t want to feel anything, but if he had to feel something he wanted it to be _pain_. The mer wanted to rip his soul out and toss it away, he wanted to tear his heart to pieces and offer it to the creatures in the depths, he wanted to rake the sharpest pieces of coral over his ears until they bled burst and he wasn’t hearing the echoes of Wade’s song with every beat of his broken heart. 

Leaving his mate had been the right decision. Humans and mers were never meant to mingle--a soul destined to live three centuries and one doomed to only a handful of decades, one bound to the sea and the other safest on land. They would never be able to swim together, to explore the seas together, to ride the waves and chase the tides and listen to the way the whales sang low and loving or the dolphins laughed excited and playful. 

It had been the right decision because Peter would never be able to leave the ocean to dance with his love in the firelight, to climb into silky sheets and lie together in a soft bed, to sit beside his Prince on the throne and rule a Kingdom he could never hope to understand. 

The right decision, and the mer had repeated it like a mantra as the sea wound him further and further south towards warmer waters and what had always been his favorite place in the world. He repeated it when he forgot to eat and his attempt at fishing was listless at best. He repeated it when other mers approached him with a coaxing trill and a hopeful gleam in their eyes and Peter turned them down over and over. 

Leaving his soulmate and letting the echo of Wade’s heart song fade into the furthest corners of his mind had been the right decision but as Peter crushed the petals of the deadly _Nymphaea_ between his fingers and let the poison seep into his skin simply so he felt something beyond _empty_ , the mer closed his eyes and let his soul weep. 

“Peter.” The mer who approached Peter in the deeper waters by the caves was handsome by anyone’s standards, heavily muscled and wonderfully baritone, thick arms and a thicker tail that shone jade green and spotted gold in the sunlight. “Peter, beauty why are you crying? Come and swim with me and I'll make you smile again.” 

It was a blatant invitation to _more_ than a swim, a knowing tilt to the mer’s head that hinted towards tangling together with heated, biting kisses, a coaxing crook of long fingers that Peter knew would twist inside him perfectly, the bulge of a pouch swollen with a heavy, ready cock and the promise of _pleasure_ as they floated languid in the current, notched together and stroking idle hands over each others skin. 

“Come swim with me.” the other mer was closer than Peter realized, swimming near and hovering purposefully intimate, large arms caging Peter in on either side and mouth parted to show off the curve of fangs behind red lips. “Peter, beauty…” 

The words trailed off into a purr and Peter turned his head from it but the mer took that as an invitation to nuzzle into his neck, to trill and click invitingly into his ear, to prick at Peter’s pulse with his teeth in an attempt to draw an answering whine from the lovely mer. 

“Come here, like this.” The mers' breath was heavy with red carrageen moss, aphrodisia and drugging. This was the way of the island communities, to indulge in the potions and sweet things that made their blood _rush_ , to meet and mate and to wind together in shiver sharp pleasure with whoever caught their eye or stirred their lust. 

It was meant to be _paradise_ and for so many years Peter had enjoyed it. In fact he'd enjoyed it so many times with this exact mer right here, the same sweet and familiar mer inching close for a hungry kiss, that it was habit and it was instinct and it was soul deep _loneliness_ that had Peter parting his lips for just a brush, just a hint of something that felt like desire…

...except it _didn’t_ feel like desire. 

The press of the mer’s mouth could have been stinging nettles, could have been the quills of the sea urchin sinking into Peter’s tongue and making him curse, making him gag as the taste of another that didn’t belong rubbed like sea salt into wounds on Peter’s ragged heart. 

“No.” he whispered, and by the gods he was so lonely and so hurt but no, **no** he didn’t want this, he didn’t want this mer, he didn’t want empty relief and faceless arms to hold him when he’d known what it meant to be _really_ loved. He knew what it meant branded, to take fullness into himself and feel fire burn into his core as and his mate moved and kissed and knew each other and this was a pale imitation of what he so badly missed.

“... _no_ …” 

“Pete, what’s wrong?” the mer pulled back in confusion and even the name sounded wrong on his mouth so Peter jerked away from it, wrenched out of the mer’s arms and struggled backwards and-- _crack_ \-- hit his head too hard on the cliff sides behind them. 

“Oh no no no---!” the mer crooned something in one of their languages, sweet and sorrowful and apologetic as he pulled Peter back in and cradled his head to stop the bleeding, pet through the curls and dislodged the pretty flower so he could see where the cut was. “Ah Pete, lovely don’t pull away when I’m trying to help you. Hold on, stay here so I can see where you're hurt!” 

The mer clicked his tongue soothingly but Peter only struggled harder, the blurring pain in his head mingling with the ever present ache in his heart and in a moment of panic where he missed his mate so badly it physically hurt, where he only knew the mer’s hands felt like knives on his skin because it wasn’t _Wade_ , where all Peter could think about was getting away, and he screamed--

“Let me go!” 

\--and the mer let him go immediately, put up both hands and pushed backwards, opened his mouth to apologize--

\--and was taken out in a cloud of _blood_ as something _unholy_ roared through the water and claws and fangs struck out to tear him to pieces. 

Peter screamed again because he didn’t know what happened, he didn’t know how they’d gone from almost kissing to his head hurting to a _monster_ tearing the other mer apart, cutting at him with fangs and fingers, snarling and growling and threatening a horrible sort of violence for daring to make his mate bleed. 

_His mate._

...his _mate_.

“Stop!” Peter pushed off the rocks and darted into the fray. “Please stop, you're going to hurt each other and I need to know who you are !”

”Stop!” he shoved between the two bigger mers and shouted for them to leave each other alone when they just ignored him and the growls grew louder. “Stop it!”

There was fresh blood in the water, spoiling scarlet and _awful_ and panic clawed at Peter's throat when his friend cried out in fear and the answering growl was so savage.

_They were going to kill each other._

“I said STOP!” Peter wasn't a delicate, fragile thing like most humans assumed mers were. He wasn't shy nor was he weak, he and his sisters were sirens and they were every bit as wicked and fierce as the ancient stories promised.

“STOP FIGHTING!” Peter threw his head back and shrieked his fiercest song, pitched his voice _horrifying_ and tore through the bodies of the fish nearby and left them floating dead and shredded in the water. The noise stopped the heart of a passing shark and with a decibel that would have killed a human, drove the mers apart and sent them reeling in the waves, hands over their ears and shoulders hunched as the sound rang brutal in their heads and threatened to break them _deaf_. 

“Stop.” Peter said again, softer this time, one hand out stretched pleadingly to the mer who had kissed him as the last of his sirens song faded on the waves. “Please just go. Just go. There is no harm done, you were not hurting me but he doesn’t know that and he will _kill_ you if you don't leave me alone. Please just go.” 

“You are not safe with him!” the mer hissed, wiping at his mouth and the bloody marks at his collarbone where the stranger had gone for his jugular. “He stinks of a witch’s curse! Come with me and allow me to treat your head and--” 

A growl that was nearly demonic and the mer shut up, wiped at his mouth again and turned his back on the pair to swim away, taking his wounded pride and unexpected _fear_ with him to find someone else to try and kiss. 

Peter watched and waited until the last hint of jade and gold had disappeared into the further waters and then turned around carefully, slowly, cautiously to take a closer look at the one who’d interrupted. 

“Who--” Peter wet his lips and swam a little closer as the mer retreated into the darker places in the rocks. “Who are you? I know you, don’t I? I know you, and that's why you were so mad that he was kissing me.”

“N--No.” the voice was familiar but it was like twilight, deeper and darker and bit through with memories Peter couldn’t quite place. “No, you don’t know me.” 

“I know you.” Peter came closer, peering through the gloom to try and see the mer’s face and gasping in soft shock when he saw what the mer was hiding. 

There were so many scars, twisted and rough across ruined skin. Flat eyes and over long fangs and a tail covered in coal black scales cracked and harmed, red and painful. No hair, no eyebrows or eyelashes and curved claws that gleamed like daggers edges. The mer looked like a demon, like a monster, like the soul of a warrior cast into the depths and as Peter looked closer and then closer again, the mer’s eyes shifted yellow and then white, yellow and then white and then back to dark brown in abject misery and uncertainty.

“Oh, I _know_ you.” Peter said again, and this time his voice hitched and the words _shook_ as his soul shifted and lifted and yearned. The picture was wrong, the perfect skin damaged beyond repair and the eyes no longer the color of the island water. The mouth was twisted over fangs, and the laughter was long gone but Peter _knew_ him. 

The picture was wrong but Peter swam close before the mer could jerk away and hide, swam close to flatten his hand to the strangers heart and close his eyes and just _listen_. 

_Music_ , quiet and thready and nearly muted beneath the clamor of other voices, the echoes of the deep as they lunged forward to take a mind and soul as their own but Peter pushed in tight and listened and finally he heard _music_. 

_Wade_.

“Oh my love.” Peter whispered shakily, reverently, brought his other hand up to frame the mer’s face and bring their foreheads together. “Oh my love, I thought I’d never see you again.” 

“You--you know me?” Fear, insecurity, anxiety, flitting the mer’s eyes yellow and then white, yellow and then white and Peter crooned low in his throat, drew his claws over the steady steady heartbeat and whispered--

“The day we met you were as a sun god fallen to the beach, and I promised to know you _always_. Whether you are a sun god, or a creature from the deep or a god of the underworld, you are my soulmate all the same.” 

“P-Pete--” 

“ _Wade_.” 

“I-- I can hear you.” Wade dared to cover Peter’s hand with his own, to press the ruin of his skin over the pure perfection that was his soulmate, and listen to Peter’s heart song as it rose lyrical and banished the white and yellow noise in his mind. “My love, I can hear you.” 

“Oh my Prince.” Peter’s eyes swirled beautiful gold as the soft notes of Wade’s song rose to join his own. “I can hear you too.” 

********

“I missed you.” 

They floated together in the slow currents of the lagoon, only inches off the sandy sea floor and equally only inches from the surface, the sun filtering over their bodies and washing warm over every touch. 

“I missed you.” Peter whispered again and this time he kissed Wade, drew his Prince in close and moved careful careful over the scars to caress Wade’s cheek and seal their lips together. “How did you find me? How did you come so far to the islands? I sang my song of forgetfulness and you shouldn’t have known me again. I'm so happy you're here, but I don't understand _how_.”

“I didn’t know you for a long time.” Wade tried not to flinch when Peter touched him, tried not to grimace from the sun and ask for shadows. His mate was so beautiful, so stunning and he was so hideous it nearly hurt to be together again. “I only remembered your song, but it wasn’t right, it was so sad and so lonely and it drove me to insanity.” 

“I’m so sorry.” Kisses again, peppering over Wade’s forehead and down his nose to brush his mouth, his chin, the line of his jaw. “I never intended for you to remember me at all. I’d wander the seas a half century longer alone before I’d cause you any grief, I swear. I'm so sorry you were so sad, but I cannot say I'm sorry for you being here with me now.”

“I went to a witch.” Wade sucked in a harsh breath when Peter’s nimble fingers tracked down his stomach and coasted over his scales, the simple touch almost overwhelming after being alone, the presence of his mate almost too much after so long _searching_. “I-- she--” 

“You’re so beautiful here.” Peter trilled into his ear, passed a tease of fangs over Wade’s lobe as he click click clicked his claws over the black scales. “I love your colors, and the red matches mine. We are a perfect pair together, it makes me so happy.”

“--she ruined me.” Wade finished thickly and the lovely mer met his gaze with startled eyes, pulled from his musings and romance by Wade's insistence on telling the truth about what had happened. “The witch ruined me, Pete. She took my song, my beauty and my charm and cast me into the sea. Three moon cycles is all I had to find you and then I found you and you were hurt-- Pete I-- I almost gave in.” 

“Gave in to what?” Peter was back to smoothing over Wade’s ruin, reverential fingers and feather soft kisses everywhere he could reach, slowing his own desire to give his mate a moment. “Gave in to what, my love?” 

“The rage.” Wade’s claws tightened at Peter’s side but before he could apologize, Peter’s red mouth parted over a quiet gasp and the next kiss was longing and hungry. “No, Pete listen I-- I could have killed that mer. I would have killed him for making you bleed. I know you think I'm a Prince Charming, but I not. I never was and now I'm more monster than--”

“No no no hush.” Peter rolled them in the water so his back ran along the soft sand and Wade was pressed on top of him, their tails moving in sync to keep their motion through the lagoon. “My Prince, hush and kiss me. I don't want to talk about that.”

“You’re not listening.” Wade stopped, pulled away entirely though every fiber of his being screamed at the thought of being separated from his mate for even a moment. “The witch turned me into a monster and before I saw you there, I was ready to leave you alone, I was ready to leave you and your beauty and let the voices from the deep whisper to me until I went mad. But then I saw you hurt and I lost myself, Pete. I’m a monster, I’m a--” 

“You’re my _soulmate_.” Peter pulled Wade in again, crushed their mouths together until Wade crumpled and faltered and fell into him with a quiet cry. “You are my Prince Charming. You went to a witch--” a cut of fangs at Wade’s neck and he growled in helpless _want_. “-- you gave everything up to come and find me and then you would have left me alone?” 

“If you--” the big mer shuddered when they rocked together again, Peter drifting down against the sand and using the leverage to arch into the next kiss, to rub himself into Wade and purr in contentment when his mate ground down into him in response. “Pete, if you wanted me to leave you, I would have-- I would have left you. You deserve more than a monster.” 

“You keep saying that word, but I do not think it means what you think it means.” Peter’s smile was slow, knowing and wicked as he licked over his fangs then leaned up to lick over Wade’s sharp points, purposefully cutting his tongue and moaning when Wade lapped at the spill. “I am not afraid of the things that creep in the dark, nor am I worried about something as fickle as beauty and as fleeting as scars. You say you are a monster, but why? Because you would have torn the throat from a mer you thought was hurting me? Because you rush feral when you see me bleed?” 

“My love.” Peter was whispering now, barely audible as he felt down beneath their bodies and cupped Wade’s cock in his hand, lifted the weighted length free of the pouch and stroked firm and intimate and possessive until Wade groaned and thrust slick through his palm. 

“You are not a monster.” Fangs again, and this time Peter drew blood from his soulmate, cut deep and drank with a contented rumble that shook their bodies, pulled away with scarlet stained teeth to murmur--

“I have lain on the rocks and sang my siren songs until the ships crashed, simply because I was bored. I’ve watched humans leap from their ships and _drown_ when I sing, and then I let their bodies waste and bloat in the sunshine because I only wanted a bite. I’ve raised my voice and broken bones apart, stopped hearts and led men to madness with my songs, driven the sea creatures to a frenzy because I like the scent of blood in the water and the way it matches the red webbing on my tail.”

Wade’s eyes widened and Peter laughed sharp and devilish and beautiful, “If you are a monster, than I am one of the most vicious kind, and still our songs rise and twist together and bind our hearts. You and I are a perfect pair, my love. _Monsters_ , and I wouldn’t have it any other way.” 

***********

… Later as they lay in the sands of the lagoon and the sunset turned the sky purple and blue and a thousand shades of pink, Peter propped himself up on an elbow and drew his claws down Wade’s cheek to his bite bruised neck, down further to his heart and tapped his nails in time to the rise and fall of their heart songs as they melded and harmonized and lifted free between their souls. 

“I love how you feel.” he murmured to his mate. “You are _real_ in my hands, if you were smooth and porcelain I’d worry you were only a dream, apt to slip away from me when the dawn came. It would break my heart.” 

And then softer, “I love the color of your eyes too. The island water is so pretty, but now your eyes shine like the burnished gold I find in the ship wrecks. Not blue like summer skies but bronze like ancient coins and found treasure. Lovely. _Perfect_. The witch thought she was cursing you, but you are more beautiful to me now than you were the day I carried you to the beach. Now you are able to be fully mine, and I am able to be fully yours.”

“I love you.” Wade leaned up for a kiss with his mate that went on and on and on, that brought them both to full arousal, panting and biting at each others lips as hands wandered and their breath hitched over purposeful touches. 

“I love you too.” Peter used his astonishing strength to wrangle Wade right back into the water, clasped their hands and drove them towards the deeper end of the lagoon, turned back and crushed their mouths together, dunked his mate simply because he _could_ then dove beneath and caught Wade up in another kiss and another and another. 

“Come, my mate.” Peter laughed in delight when Wade clutched him tight and dug his fangs in over his pulse. “Come and let me make good on my promise to you.” 

“Which promise is that?” Wade wanted to know and Peter’s eyes flickered gold, his lips parted teasingly as he crooked his fingers for Wade to come _closer_. 

“Now you are a mer and we can swim together, let me show you how everything's better under the sea.”

********

Epilogue

********

The witch stood in front of her charmed mirror and sang a quiet song as she combed through her hair, each pass of the bone handled piece turning inky black strands glossy in the sunlight. 

In a cup off to the side lay the remnants of the Crown Prince’s curse, pieces she’d kept aside for her own use-- a lock of blond hair, a crushed flower the same shade of blue Wade’s eyes before she’d taken them, blood gathered from where he’d cut himself on the rocks, saliva from the rim of the bowl the Prince had drank out of. 

The witch snapped her fingers and the contents of the bowl burst into purple flame, the smoke thick and poisonous where it rose in the air and Shiklah paused in combing her hair to lean over and inhale deep of the potion, let it fill her senses and cloud her mind and swirl mist through her yellow eyes. 

And then yellow eyes turned _blue_ , a pass of the comb through her hair and the midnight tresses burned blonde and with a few muttered incantations the reflection in the mirror morphed, shifted until a lovely girl of no more than twenty was standing where the witch had one stood.

Sky blue eyes and white blond hair and when Shiklah went back to singing her song, her voice was higher, sweeter and softer and rang through with a twist of _hypnosis_ no mortal man would be able to resist. 

The picture in the charmed mirror blurred and then changed, a portal into the castle and Shiklah’s new form watched with narrowed eyes as King Thomas hurried through the halls shouting about finding Wade, about where the hell his son could have gone and the gods help him, they had _better_ bring the Crown Prince home. 

Thomas was pathetic and she hated him, but Shiklah had moved past seeking revenge on the King. No, she had a much better idea in mind and her newly full lips turned up into a smile when the other Prince came into view.

 _Francis_.

“Oh you poor unfortunate soul.” she said laughingly, mockingly, one long nail tracing Francis’ form across the glass. “I think it’s high time you fell in love with someone who will ruin you and bring this Kingdom to it’s knees…” 

“...shouldn’t take me longer than three days.” 

****************

**_Chapter Notes:_ **

_\-- I feel like I could have written for actual days about how hard it was for Wade to adjust to being a mer, but I was already way over that word limit I pretend not to notice._

_\-- The mers Wade meet are supposed to be Natasha, then Bucky and Steve, and then the one with Peter is supposed to be Harry._

_\-- I love the mental image of Spideypool just floating in a shallow lagoon kissing and touching and being soft. Peter being horny while Wade is trying to prove he's a monster and then Peter basically laughing at that idea and announcing all of HIS monstery qualities? Love it._

_\-- "Poor unfortunate souls" and "three days" are of course, Little Mermaid references and I actually cackled to myself writing that line. Not that Francis is a bad guy in this fic, he's just easy for me to pick on._

Can't wait to hear what you guys think! Don't forget if you want to talk about the fic/get more insight and answers to any questions you have, you can hit up my [**TUMBLR ASK BOX** ](https://not-close-to-straight.tumblr.com/ask)and I'll chat back with you! 


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